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ADVENTURES  IN 
AMERICAN  BOOK  SHOPS 


BOOKS  BY  GUIDO  BRUNO 

Eternal  Moments 

Sentimental  Studies 

A  Night  in  Greenwich  Village 

Fragments  From  Greenwich  Village 

The  Sacred  Band 

Moore  Versus  Harris 

Adventures  in  American  Bookshops 


To  be  published  in  December, 
Stories  By  the  Way 
A  Handful  of  Contemporaries 
Near  the  Night  Lamp 


Adventures  in  American 
Bookshops y  Antique  Stores 
and  Auction  Rooms 


By  Guido  Bruno 


Detroit:  The  Douglas  Book  Shop 

ig22 


3 


Copyright,  1922, 

by 
GUIDO  BRUNO 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


SRiF 


m 


c :  3S^6^^^^ 


/  dedicate  these  pages  to  Helen 
Raab  in  grateful  memory  of  our 
happy     hours    in     Book     Shops 

November,  1922. 


One  thousand  copies  of  this  book  have 
been  printed  and  the  type  distributed. 


No. 


(fg/ 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

Preface ; 9 

The  Romance  of  Buying  and  Selling  Old  Things     11 

Auctions  as  Amusement  Places 24 

The  Strange  Discovery  and  Disappearance  of 

Stuart's  Washington 30 

New  York  Book  Shops 39 

Den  of  a  Pessimist 

A  Whitman  Enthusiast 

An  Optimist 

A  Gambler 

Bookshops  of  Enthusiasts 

Book  Dealers  in  Cobwebbed  Corners 

Specialists  in  Excitement 

Dealers  in  Literary  Property 

Autograph   Brokers IZ 

Our  President's  Handwriting 76 

The  Romance  of  a  Chicago  Book  Dealer 87 

Chicago  Book  Shops 91 

Chicago    Revisited 95 


In   Boston 100 

Small  Town  StufiF 108 

New  York  Book  Magnates 112 

Snapshots  in  Art  Galleries  on  Fifth  Avenue Ill 

'Way  Down  in  Greenwich  Village 120 

President  Harding's  Favorite  Book 126 

Index 126 


Preface 

THESE  sketches  appeared  originally  in  Pearson's 
Magazine,  Bruno's  Weekly  and  the  Book  Hunt- 
er, and  I  make  grateful  acknowledgment  for  per- 
mission to  reprint. 

On  reading  the  proofs,  I  feel  I  have  not  done  justice 
to  my  bookselling  friends.  I  wandered  into  their 
shops,  I  browsed  among  their  books,  I  listened  to 
their  talk  and  wrote  it  down  ....  pictures  not 
studies,  impressions  not  descriptions.  Some  of  my  friends 
have  since  passed  on  to  a  better  world  and  in  these 
pages  will  be  found  perhaps  the  only  record  of  their 
useful  and  laborious  lives.  This,  I  believe,  is  one  ex- 
cuse for  the  existence  of  my  little  book. 

In  the  April  issue,  1917,  of  Pearson's  appeared  an 
article  of  mine  telling  about  that  wonderstore  of 
Brentano's  in  New  York  about  the  late  Deutschberger 
and  about  other  old-time  booksellers  of  Fourth 
Avenue  and  Union  Square.  I  was  unable  to  procure 
a  copy  of  this  magazine  and  therefore  had  to  omit 
this  important  story  in  this  compilation. 

While  in  Detroit  recently  I  met  the  charming  Mr. 
Higgins,  dean  of  Michigan's  booksellers,  and  he  ob- 
jected to  my  statement  in  one  of  my  articles:  "Detroit 
has  not  one  second-hand  Book  Shop."  I  gladly  take 
it  back.  Mr.  Higgins  has  a  whole  houseful  of  gems 
and  27  packing  boxes  filled  with  rare  first  editions 
and  scarce  Americana.  His  three  shops  would  make 
our  metropolitan  friends  justly  envious.  When  I 
wrote  years  ago  about  Detroit's  bookshops  I  had  not 
met  Walter  MacKee,  who  holds  open  house  in  Shee- 
han's  and  is  not  only  a  good  bookman  but  also  a 
talented  comedian.  I  had  not  signed  my  name  in 
Mr.  La  Belle's  guestbook  in  MacCaully  Brothers' 
store  where  authors  passing  Detroit  are  made  wel- 
come. I  had  not  visited  Mr.  Dennen's  Book  Shop, 
where  jeweled  prayer  books,  rare  Shakespeare  edi- 
tions, can  be  had  as  well  as  the  newest  novels  and 


books  on  golf.  I  had  not  then  visited  Mr.  Proctor's 
Clarion  Shop  in  Orchestra  Hall,  the  gayest  little 
place,  thanks  to  Mr.  Knopf's  love  of  vivid  colors. 
Mrs.  Morris,  in  the  Hudson  Department  Store,  created 
a  delightful  nook  for  her  book  department.  Finally, 
Mr.  Gordon  came  to  Detroit  as  standard-bearer  of  the 
Powner's  Book  Interests,  vv^ho  acquired  recently  the 
Reyerson  Book  Shop.  AUister  Crowley's  beautiful 
Equinox  had  something  to  do  with  the  bankruptcy 
of  this  old  firm,  I  am  told.  Mrs.  Gordon,  who  was 
Miss  Powner  before  her  marriage,  is  taking  an  active 
interest  and  perpetuating  the  traditions  of  a  family  of 
booklovers. 

And  there  is  Mr.  Shaffat's  book  store  on  Hastings 
Street,  with  its  framed  letter  by  the  late  Roosevelt 
who  purchased  here  an  important  book  on  Africa  dur- 
ing the  last  months  of  his  presidency. 

Now  I  have  made  amends  for  my  hasty  statement. 
I  hope  Mr.  Higgins  will  read  these  lines  and  accept 
my  humble  apologies. 

GUIDO  BRUNO. 


November,  1922. 


The  Romance  of  Buying  and 
Selling  Old  Things 

OLD  things  of  all  description  may  lose  their  value 
and  desirability  to  their  temporary  owners,  but 
never  to  the  world.  Nothing  disappears  com- 
pletely. The  smallest  piece  of  tissue  paper  that  has 
served  as  a  wrapper  for  an  orange  and  is  swept  along 
the  sidewalk  by  a  stray  wind  will  ultimately  be 
gathered  by  some  one  and  again  put  to  some  use. 

Objects  which  find  their  way  through  the  back  door 
of  a  Fifth  Avenue  mansion  into  a  rubbish  wagon 
and  are  carried  away  will  re-appear  in  some  flat  of 
a  tenement  house  as  a  new  and  welcome  addition  to 
somebody's  comfort. 

Articles  discarded  in  tenement  house  dwellings  and 
sold  for  a  few  pennies  to  a  ragman  are  triumphantly 
brought  into  the  reception  room  of  a  patrician  man- 
sion, treasured  by  the  new  owners,  and  admired  by 
his  friends. 

Curious  and  extraordinary  are  the  fortunes  of  old 
objects  on  their  way  to  a  new  proprietor  with  whom 
they  will  stay  for  a  while,  and  their  wanderings  are 
eternal. 

Old  things  in  New  York  are  sold  in  magnificent 
establishments  on  Fifth  Avenue,  and  they  are  sold 
in  dungeons  on  the  Bowery.  Some  people  are  so  poor 
that  they  have  to  buy  "second-hand  things"  to  furnish 
their  homes  and  clothe  their  bodies.  Others  are  so 
rich  that  they  are  compelled  to  buy  antiques  in  order 
to  possess  something  unique. 

But  the  men  who  deal  in  old  things,  whose  chosen 
calling  it  is  to  buy  and  to  sell  antiques  and  second- 
hand wares  are  the  true  adventurers  among  the  busi- 
ness men  of  New  York.  No  matter  whether  their 
finger  nails  and  manners  are  polished  and  they  en- 
tertain prospective  buyers  in  luxurious  display  rooms, 
or,  whether  they  walk  in  tenement  house  districts 
from  door  to  door,  ready  to  buy  anything  and  every- 


12  ADVENTURES 


thing,  or  whether  they  wait  for  customers  in  their 
stuffy  shops  on  Park  Row  or  Baxter  Street;  they 
all  possess  the  hope  that  some  day  they  will  make 
the  find,  and  buy  for  a  song  something  they  will  be 
able  to  sell  for  a  large  amount.  Not  money  but  the 
game  of  hunting  after  the  unexpected,  and  the  thrill 
in  finding  it,  constitute  the  lure  that  attracts  the 
seeker  after  old  things. 

The  Poor  Man's  Hunting  Ground 

There  are  many  people  on  the  streets  of  New  York 
taken  for  granted  without  further  question.  Have 
you  ever  seen  early  in  the  morning  when  people  sit 
around  the  breakfast  table,  a  cleanly  dressed  man, 
with  wrapping  paper  and  cord  under  his  arms,  walk- 
ing in  the  roadway,  looking  up  at  the  windows  of 
private  houses  and  ejaculating  every  five  or  ten  paces 
some  inarticulate  noises? 

If  you  lean  out  of  the  window  and  watch  him  you 
will  see  him  disappear  into  some  of  the  houses,  and 
if  you  wait  for  his  reappearance  you  will  notice  that 
his  wrapping  paper  has  now  become  a  bundle. 

"Cash-Clothes!  Cash-Clothes!"  Untiringly  he  cries 
out  these  two  words  at  the  people  who  dwell  in  the 
houses  he  passes.  Servants  frequently  answer  the  call 
of  "cash-clothes"  and  let  the  man  in  through  the  back 
door  as  a  welcome  buyer  of  discarded  wearing  apparel 
of  their  masters  and  mistresses. 

What  does  he  do  with  his  purchases? 

Once  I  beckoned  to  a  kindly-looking  old  man  whose 
wrapping  paper  was  still  neatly  folded  under  his  arm, 
to  come  up  to  my  room.  How  he  ever  found  my 
dwelling  place  among  all  the  other  doors  of  the  studio 
'  building,  is  a  riddle  to  me.  I  answered  his  knock. 
He  remained  quietly  standing  at  the  door,  his  hat  in 
his  hand: 

"What  have  you  got  to  sell?"  he  asked  very  busi- 
ness-like, taking  in  the  appearance  of  the  room  with 
one  glance. 

"I  have  nothing  for  sale,"  I  told  him.  "But  I  would 
like  to  know  more  about  your  business.     I  wish  you 


INBOOKSHOPS  13 


would  tell  me  what  sort  of  things  you  buy  and  what 
you  do  with  them  after  you  have  purchased  them?" 

"Of  course,  I  am  willing  to  pay  you  for  your  time 
if  you  will  be  kind  enough  to  name  your  price,  for 
say,  half-an-hour." 

He  hesitated  a  bit,  looked  around  scrutinizingly, 
and  something  evidently  convinced  him  that  I  was 
"all  right."  I  invited  him  to  take  a  seat.  He  said 
half  an  hour  of  his  time  would  be  worth  fifty  cents, 
I  gained  more  of  his  confidence  by  paying  the  fifty 
cents  in  advance  and  after  some  more  questioning  he 
told  me  his  story  and  the  story  of  about  two  thou- 
sand other  men  who  are  following  the  same  calling  in 
New  York. 

"I  start  out  every  morning  at  seven  o'clock.  I  take 
with  me  all  the  cash  I  have  in  this  world,  heavy  wrap- 
ping paper  and  cord,  and  then  I  walk  the  streets.  Just 
as  I  attracted  you  I  draw  the  attention  of  persons 
who  really  mean  business.  They  sell  for  various  rea- 
sons; some  sell  clothes  or  shoes  or  bedding  or  under- 
wear because  they  need  money  very  badly;  pawn- 
shops don't  lend  them  anything  on  their  over-worn 
clothes,  and  I  am  about  the  only  purchaser  they  can 
find.  Other  people  want  to  get  things  out  of  the  way. 
They  are  moving  and  their  trunks  cannot  hold  all 
the  stuff  they  have  accumulated.  I  buy  everything 
that   I  can  carry. 

"No,  I  have  no  place  of  business.  I  have  to  turn 
my  money  over  at  once  or  I  should  be  out  of  work 
tomorrow.  I  walk  about  picking  up  stuflF  until  eleven 
o'clock  and  then  go  to  Baxter  Street  and  sell. 

In    the    afternoon    I    go    into    another    part   of    the    jT 
city  and  again  buy  up  as  much  as  I  can  get  and  in  the  ■■* 
evening  between  five  and  six,  back  to  Baxter  Street." 

"What  is  on  Baxter  Street?"  I  interjected. 

"That's  where  all  the  dealers  are.  I  sell  to  dealers 
only  and  they  have  fixed  prices.  For  instance,  we  get 
from  seventy-five  cents  to  one  dollar  for  a  pair  of 
trousers  without  patches,  twenty-five  cents  to  fifty 
cents  for  patched-up  trousers,  according  to  the  extent 
of  the  necessary  repairs.    Waistcoats  bring  fifty  cents, 


14  ADVENTURES 


coats  from  twenty-five  cents  up  to  a  dollar.  Shoes  ac- 
cording to  their  condition,  anything  from  five  cents 
to  seventy-five  cents.  Hats,  neckties,  shirts,  collars; 
socks  bring  a  few  pennies  only,  according  to  their 
attractiveness.  Overcoats  are  in  great  demand  in  the 
cold  season.  They  bring  from  one  dollar  up  to  five 
dollars.  Women's  dresses  bring  about  the  same 
prices.  I  usually  make  from  twenty-five  to  fifty  cents 
profit  on  the  dollar.  Often  I  make  a  hundred  per 
cent  and  often,  too,  I  make  a  mistake  and  lose  money. 
Once  in  a  while  I  pick  up  a  piece  of  jewelry,  but  peo- 
ple don't  sell  jewelry  outright.  They  would  rather 
pawn  it,  and  then  sell  the  pawn  ticket. 

"I've  bought  pawn  tickets.  I  paid  ten  per  cent 
of  the  loaned  amount,  but  I  got  stung  so  often  by 
buying  fake  tickets  that  I  don't  bother  with  them 
any  more.  I  know  people  who  go  about  as  I  do  who 
make  ten  and  fifteen  dollars  the  day,  but  I  call  it  a 
fair  day  if  I  clear  from  three  to  five  dollars.  Ten 
dollars  is  about  a  fair  capital  to  start  with  in  buying 
and  selling  old  clothes,  but  I  know  a  man  who  ptarted 
with  fifty  cents  and  in  less  than  a  year  he  owned 
a  shop  on  Baxter  Street. 

"Once  I  had  a  great  day.  A  man  called  me  in.  It 
was  on  Forty-fifth  Street,  and  I  think  he  must  have 
been  an  actor.  He  asked  me  to  take  away  all  the 
clothes  contained  in  a  big  trunk  in  his  room.  They 
were  all  women's  clothes  of  expensive  fabric.  I  had 
to  come  three  times  before  I  had  taken  it  all  away. 

"  'How  much  will  you  give  me  for  it?'  he  inquired. 
All  I  had  in  my  pocket  was  twelve  dollars.  I  made 
him  an  offer  of  ten  dollars,  and  I  was  never  more 
ashamed  of  myself  than  in  that  moment.  But  he 
didn't  pay  any  attention  to  me.  He  smoked  a  cig- 
arette and  simply  said :  'That  will  be  all  right,  but  take 
it  out  immediately.'  I  made  bundles  and  carried  it 
out  in  portions.  I  gave  him  ten  dollars.  I  laid  the 
money  on  the  table,  and  before  I  left  the  room  the 
last  time,  I  said:  'Mister,  here  are  the  ten  dollars,' 
pointing  to  the  money  that  was  still  laying  on  the 
table.    'Take  it  along,  too,'  was  his  answer.    "It  would 


INBOOKSHOPS  IS 


bring  me  only  bad  luck.  Take  it  quickly  and  get 
out  with  you.' 

"I  got  frightened  and  took  the  money  and  went 
downstairs  to  the  landlady  of  the  rooming  house  and 
asked  her  whether  he  was  'all  right,'  whether  it  was 
safe  to  buy  the  things  from  him. 

"The  landlady  answered:  'Oh,  yes,  he's  all  right, 
the  poor  fellow.  His  wife  ran  away  with  some  other 
man  only  yesterday,  and  he  seems  to  take  it  very 
hard.' 

"Another  time  I  found  a  five-dollar  gold  piece  in 
a  waistcoat  that  I  bought  from  a  Jap  in  a  big  house 
on  Madison  Avenue.  I  went  back  with  it,  and  told 
him  that  he  had  forgotten  the  five  dollars  which  I 
found  in  the  garment.  He  gave  me  two  dollars  and 
a  half  and  told  me  that  I  was  a  damned  fool.  I  am 
sure  the  waistcoat  and  the  money  had  belonged  to  his 
master. 

"If  one  wants  to  take  chances,  big  money  can  be 
made  in  buying  old  clothes.  I  have  an  uncle — he  is 
dead  now — peace  be  with  his  soul! — who  made  thou- 
ands  of  dollars.  But  he  was  constantly  mixed  up  with 
the  police  and  had  to  pay  graft  on  all  hands,  and 
lived  in  perpetual  fear  that  something  unfortunate 
would  happen  to  him.  I  wouldn't  touch  such  busi- 
ness. 

"He  went  to  the  Tenderloin  and  to  the  bad  houses: 
he  knew  girls  who  were  living  a  fast  life.  He  would 
buy  their  clothes  and  their  jewelry  for  next  to  noth- 
ing if  they  needed  money  to  pay  fines  in  the  Night 
Court,  or  if  they  were  driven  out  by  the  police  and 
had  to  leave  for  another  dwelling.  He  would  sell 
those  things,  perhaps  on  the  same  day  for  a  hundred 
times  as  much  money  to  other  girls  who  were  flush. 
But  the  money  brought  no  blessing  to  him.  His  son 
is  blind  and  he  himself  died  of  cancer  in  the  hospital, 
and  he  was  in  awful  pain  to  the  last  moment." 

Again  I  interrupted  my  visitor,  who  seemed  very 
generous  with  his  time,  and  asked  him: 

"But  what  happens  to  the  things  on  Baxter  Street 
after  you  have  sold  them  to  the  stores?" 


16  ADVENTURES 


"They  go  to  the  four  winds,"  he  said,  pointing  char- 
acteristically with  his  upturned  thumb.  "People  buy 
them  and  wear  them  again;  dealers  from  uptown  bu}- 
the  better  things  and  put  them  in  their  shops;  there 
are  never  enough  goods  on  the  market.  But  why 
don't  you  go  down  to  Baxter  Street  and  see  for  your- 
self?" 

The  Open  Air  Exchange  on  Baxter  Street 

Baxter  Street  is  situated  in  the  oldest  part  of  New 
York.  Fifty  to  seventy-five  years  ago  the  houses  were 
private  homes  occupied  by  respectable  and  well-to-do 
citizens,  by  merchants  after  whom  streets  and  places 
are  named  today.  The  street  is  lined  with  shops. 
Clothes  are  displayed  along  the  house  fronts;  shoes  in 
long  rows  lie  along  the  show  windows;  while  boxes 
with  neckties  in  profusion  invite  the  lover  of  colors 
to  make  a  selection.  Business  is  carried  on  in  the 
street.  The  stores  are  dark  and  seem  to  serve  merely 
as  workshops  and  store  rooms.  About  noon  I  strolled 
down  the  street  and  took  in  the  sights  which  are  as . 
confusing  as  the  turmoil  in  Broad  Street  during  the 
busiest  hours  of  the  Curb  Market.  Men  with  bundles 
on  their  backs  and  with  pushcarts  were  constantly  ar- 
riving. They  offered  the  contents  of  their  packages 
for  sale.  Others  stood  about  looking  at  the  various 
wares  and  making  offers.  Dickering  was  going  on  in 
all  quarters.  Things  changed  hands  rapidly.  There 
was  one  dark  overcoat  with  a  Persian  lamb  collar 
which  had  originally  been  brought  in  by  a  "Cash- 
clothes"  man.  The  coat  was  sold  to  the  proprietor 
of  one  of  these  stores  and  resold  at  once  to  a  man 
who  had  watched  the  original  bargaining.  The  same 
coat  was  thrown  upon  a  pushcart  with  several  other 
overcoats  and  sold  "wholesale"  to  a  third  man  who 
evidently  took  his  purchases  out  of  the  district.  In 
a  basement  I  noticed  an  unusually  tall  and  dignified 
looking  man  wearing  a  sombrero  who  didn't  seem  to 
pay  much  attention  to  the  buying  and  selling  of  his 
clerks,  or  were  they  his  sons?  He  really  looked  like 
a  Western    Colonel,   and   I   christened   him   at   once 


INBOOKSHOPS  17 


"Colonel  Baxter."  He  was  very  friendly  and  acces- 
sible. He  answered  my  many  inquiries:  "You  see 
these  men  with  the  bundles  and  pushcarts?  They 
have  bought  the  stuff  all  over  the  city,  and  now  they 
are  disposing  of  it  at  the  best  prices  they  can  get." 

"I  know,"  I  cried,  "how  they  get  it.  But  please 
tell  me  what  you  do  with  it  after  you  have  bought  it." 

"Come  inside  with  me  and  I'll  show  you,"  was  his 
answer.  We  descended  to  his  basement.  Piles  of 
clothes  and  shoes  lay  on  the  floor,  they  must  have 
been  recently  purchased.  He  opened  the  door  and 
we  entered  a  veritable  workshop.  Several  gas  arms 
illuminated  the  room  which  had  a  low  ceiling.  The 
air  was  thick  and  at  least  ten  men  and  women  were 
at  work. 

"Here  is  our  laundry,"  and  he  pointed  to  one  corner 
of  the  room. 

"All  underclothes,  shirts  and  collars,  overalls  and 
linen  suits  are  washed  and  ironed  here.  We  sell  only 
by  the  dozen  and  to  dealers  uptown." 

"Over  there  is  the  tailor  shop.  We  clean  the  clothes 
which  come  in,  sew  on  the  buttons,  press  them  and 
make  them  look  as  good  as  possible.  We  are  whole- 
salers only.  We  sell  old  things  by  the  dozen  just  as 
factory  owners  sell  new  things  in  large  quantities  only. 
But  there  are  many  shops  on  Baxter  Street  which 
cater  to  private  customers.  This  part  of  the  city  is 
frequented  by  "down-and-outers,"  men  who  come 
from  no  one  knows  where.  They  stay  a  while;  they 
sleep  wherever  they  are  undisturbed,  they  hang  out 
in  our  saloons  and  then  they  disappear.  These  men 
have  to  buy  clothes.  They  very  rarely  have  money; 
a  quarter  is  about  the  biggest  sum  which  passes  at  a 
time  through  their  hands. 

"These  people  and  their  like  from  other  parts  of  the 
city  are  the  customers  of  our  shops.  A  man  could 
get  a  complete  and  very  decent  outfit  with  a  couple 
of  changes  of  underwear  for  about  three  dollars.  He 
can  buy  a  collar  for  a  penny,  a  necktie  from  two  cents 
to  a  nickel,  a  hat  from  fifteen  cents  or  a  quarter.  Our 
shops  here  are  cheaper  than  the  Salvation  Army  'de- 
partment stores,'  and  we  don't  make  any  pretences  to 


18  ADVENTURES 


be  charitable  or  especially  kind  to  people  because  we 
sell  to  them.  And  we  have  to  pay  for  things,  we  don't 
get  them  for  nothing. 

"Before  the  war,  immigrants  used  to  come  down  on 
Saturday  and  Sunday  in  great  numbers  and  even  fairly 
well-to-do  immigrants  who  have  been  in  this  coun- 
try several  years  cannot  get  accustomed  to  purchasing 
new  things  and  pay  us  a  shopping  visit  occasionally. 
In  many  countries  in  Europe  the  laboring  classes 
seem  to  be  under  the  impression  that  they  must  buy 
second-hand  things  to  wear.  They  are  our  best  cus- 
tomers, but  they  also  believe  that  if  we  ask  a  dollar 
for  something  we  really  mean  fifty  cents,  and  so, 
therefore,  vie  have  to  advance  our  prices  fifty  and 
seventy-five  per  cent,  and  if  we  get  a  little  more  than 
we  really  expected  to  get,  the  time  is  takes  in  dicker- 
ing with  these  people  is  worth  the  money. 

"Men  and  women  in  all  walks  of  life  who  have  met 
with  reverses  steal  down  to  us  in  the  darkness  of  the 
evening,  afraid  to  be  noticed  by  someone  who  might 
know  them,  and  they  buy  their  overcoats  or  their 
shoes." 

"But  Colonel  Baxter,"  I  interrupted  him,  "to  whom 
do  you  'wholesale'  your  own  goods?" 

He  seemed  pleased  with  the  new  name  I  had  be- 
stowed upon  him,  and  explained: 

"In  certain  parts  of  Sixth  Avenue,  of  Eighth  Ave- 
nue and  of  Ninth  Avenue,  there  are  'second-hand 
stores'  which  cater  to  a  peculiar  class  of  customers. 
These  want  snappy  clothes,  shirts  with  modern  pat- 
terns, coats  fashionably  cut,  but  they  have  not  the 
money  to  purchase  them  in  the  shops  where  such 
goods  are  sold.  They  sneer  at  cheap  clothes  cut 
roughly  but  made  out  of  good  material.  They  want 
to  appear  flashy.  You  see  them  on  the  street  cor- 
ners and  in  police  courts.  We  supply  these  stores 
with  their  needs.  We  specialize  in  everything  that 
they  can  possibly  use." 

In  the  meantime,  the  open-air  exchange  on  Baxter 
Street  had  reached  its  culmination,  voices  surged 
through  the  air  like  shrapnel  bursting  here  and  there 


INBOOKSHOPS  19 


creating  disturbance.  Everybody  seemed  eager  to 
buy,  eager  to  sell,  money  was  exchanged  in  doorways, 
on  sidewalks,  bundles  were  tossed  from  pushcart  to 
pushcart "Much  ado  about  clothing." 

The  Salvation  Army 

Of  course  you  have  seen  Salvation  Army  wagons 
on  the  streets.  An  elderly  gentleman  usually  occupies 
the  driver's  seat.  The  horse  moves  on  slowly  and 
solemnly  as  if  to  the  air  of  a  very  slow  litany.  The 
wagon  is  loaded  with  papers  and  books,  with  pieces 
of  old  furniture,  and  with  bundles  of  clothing.  The 
wagon  proceeds  from  door  to  door.  The  horse  stops. 
The  old  gentleman  descends  from  his  seat,  rings  the 
bell  of  the  house  and  asks: 

"Any  old  things  for  the  Salvation  Army?" 

You  have  heard  a  good  deal  of  the  Salvation  Army, 
and  so  you  don't  hesitate  to  turn  over  some  things 
you  cannot  use  to  the  wagon.  The  elderly  gentleman 
in  Salvation  uniform  takes  everything  he  can  get  hold 
of.  You,  of  course,  think  that  the  magazines  are  sent 
to  hospitals  to  be  read  by  the  poor  lonesome  patients, 
that  the  clothes  are  distributed  among  the  needy,  and 
the  furniture  given  to  some  wretched  families  who 
have  no  beds  to  sleep  on  or  to  others  whose  hard- 
hearted landlord  deprived  them  of  chairs  and  tables. 
Let  us  take  a  walk  to  one  of  the  many  industrial 
homes  of  the  Salvation  Army  when  the  wagons  come 
in,  and  the  things  are  assorted  and  assigned  to  the 
diflferent  departments,  and  you  will  see  what  a  gross 
mistake  you  made  by  assuming  that  your  gifts  are 
given  away.  They  go  to  the  needy  all  right,  perhaps 
to  the  neediest  of  the  needy,  but  for  cash  exclusively, 
and  no  credit  is  granted. 

Books  and  magazines  are  turned  over  at  once  to 
the  book  department,  which  conducts  a  book  store  on 
Fourteenth  Street  near  Union  Square,  not  in  the  name 
of  the  Salvation  Army,  but  in  the  name  of  the  Reli- 
ance Book  Store.  Its  employees  are  experienced 
booksellers  who  do  not  wear  the  Salvation  uniform. 
In  fact,  every  possible  indication  that  this  store  be- 


20  ADVENTURES 


longs  to  the  Salvation  Army  is  carefully  concealed. 
Magazines  are  here  sold  wholesale  to  other  dealers 
or  retail  to  you  or  to  me  or  to  anybody.  The  maga- 
zines given  to  the  Salvation  Army  by  charitable  people 
are  sold  for  from  five  to  fifteen  cents  each.  A  very 
well-equipped  rare  book  department  attracts  collec- 
tors from  all  over  the  city;  "Book  Prices  Current"  is 
the  guide  for  the  sales  prices.  School  books  are  sold 
in  great  quantities.  I  believe  the  profit  of  this  shop 
to  be  far  greater  than  of  any  other  book  shop  in  the 
city,  as  its  proprietors  do  not  need  to  pay  for  the 
books  they  are  selling. 

There  seems  to  be  a  good  deal  of  hypocrisy  in 
concealing  the  fact  that  the  Salvation  Army  owns  the 
Reliance  Book  Store.  Why  not  put  a  sign  out  that 
would  tell  everyone  that  the  books  and  magazines  sold 
have  been  received  as  gifts  for  the  poor  and  sick  by 
the  Salvation  Army? 

The  so-called  industrial  homes  sustain  furniture 
factories  where  skilled  labor  is  employed  to  rejuvenate 
furniture  collected  by  the  wagons.  Antique  furniture 
dealers  have  the  pick  of  the  really  valuable  things  and 
hundreds  of  dollars  are  often  paid  for  something 
which  has  been  carted  away  as  junk  by  the  Salvation 
Army's  ragman. 

The  "Salvation  Army  Department  Store,"  a  sort  of 
a  systematized  and  orderly  looking  junk  shop,  con- 
tains and  displays  everything  to  fit  out  men  and 
women  from  head  to  foot.  The  things  are  scrupu- 
lously clean,  but  sold  at  far  higher  prices  than  in  the 
shops  of  our  friends  on  Baxter  Street. 

The  buyers  who  come  here  are  mostly  people  re- 
cently picked  up  by  the  Salvation  Army  and  em- 
ployed in  some  of  their  shops.  They  are  not  treated 
with  the  courtesy  due  to  a  customer,  but  with  the 
brutality   of  a   charity  worker. 

It  will  not  be  out  of  place  to  interject  here  a  few 
words  about  the  methods  employed  by  the  Salvation 
Army  in  recruiting  its  shopmen.  They  are  unfortun- 
ate people  out  of  work  without  a  home,  down-and-out 
in  spirit,  perhaps  just  released  from  hospital  or  prison. 


• 


INBOOKSHOPS  21 


They  receive  some  food,  a  bed  remembered  with  a 
shudder  in  years  to  come  and  they  receive  a  few  pen- 
nies for  work  which  represents  many  dollars  to  the 
Army.  Mental  and  physical  constraint  is  constantly 
exercised  over  them.  The  discipline  of  a  Salvation 
Army  Industrial  Home  is  very  similar  to  the  prison 
rules  of  twenty-five  years  ago.  All  these  broken- 
down  men  to  whom  the  Salvation  Army  "grants  a 
temporary  home"  were  originally  promised  regular 
work  and  employment  through  friends  of  the  army. 
Naturally,  it  is  in  the  interest  of  the  Army  to  keep 
them  as  long  as  possible,  especially  if  they  happen  to 
be  good  workmen,  and  only  such  men  are  really  wel- 
comed with  open  arms.  They  will  not  receive  the 
promised  employment  as  long  as  the  Army  can  pos- 
sibly keep  them  in  its  own  shops.  To  quit  the  "home" 
is  synonymous  with  an  escape  from  prison  and  usually 
they  are  worse  off  when  they  quit  the  Salvation  Army 
than  before  they  went  in.  The  few  cents  they  earned 
they  were  compelled  to  spend  in  small  purchases  in 
the  Salvation  Army  Department  Store.  Thus  the  Sal- 
vation Army  robs  unfortunate  men  and  women  of  the 
last  shred  of  their  faith  in  humanity. 

The  Salvation  Army  is  the  greatest  bargain  hunter 
in  New  York.  Trained  bookmen  and  art  experts 
choose  the  most  valuable  among  the  books  and  pic- 
tures brought  in  on  collection  wagons.  They  employ 
connoisseurs  of  bric-a-brac  and  do  a  large  business 
with  the  antique  dealers. 

Connoisseurs 

When  a  man  has  made  money  in  America  he  at 
once  becomes  a  victim  to  the  craze  for  an  artistic 
home.  The  tradespeople  with  whom  he  comes  in  con- 
tact in  order  to  achieve  his  artistic  desires  speak  of 
art  and  rugs  and  paintings.  He  reads  in  the  news- 
papers about  Mr.  So.-and-So  who  spent  thousands  of 
dollars  for  antique  furniture  or  for  pictures  in  auc- 
tions, and  he  begins  his  walks  on  these  dangerous  and 
costly  grounds  where  one  may  buy  for  goodly  sums 
the  ephemeral  fame  of  a  collector  and  a  lover  of  ob- 


22  ADVENTURES 


jects  of  art.  The  reputation  of  an  art  expert  seems  to 
go  with  the  objects  as  well  as  the  wrapping  paper 
and  string. 

It  is  the  dream  of  every  antique  dealer  once  in  his 
life  to  enter  one  of  those  coveted  garrets  where  treas- 
urs  of  six  generations  are  stored  in  boxes,  in  cases  and 
trunks.  To  enter  this  garret  at  the  invitation  of  some 
real  estate  owner  or  lawyer  who  represents  an  estate 
anxious  to  sell  the  house  and  to  clear  out  the  'rub- 
bish"; to  buy  the  contents  of  such  a  garret  for  a  few 
dollars  and  to  find  a  painting  by  Rubens  or  Tintoretto 
or  Martha  Washington's  wedding  slippers  or  a  suite 
of  magnificent  Colonial  furniture.  .  .  .  sure  enough 
these  are  red-letter  days  in  the  career  of  almost  every 
antique  dealer.  Only  recently,  for  instance,  in  an  old 
garret  on  Ninth  Street,  an  old  Persian  rug  was  dis- 
covered which  no  second-hand  dealer  would  have  paid 
fifty  cents  for,  an  expert  rug  man  realized  its  value, 
gave  eighteen  hundred  dollars  for  it  in  competition 
with  other  dealers  and  sold  it  to  a  famous  rug  col- 
lector for  twenty-six  thousand  dollars. 

Some  time  ago  a  buyer  of  Marshall  Field  in  Chi- 
cago saw  a  painting  in  one  of  the  minor  art  shops  of 
the  city.  He  liked  it  and  purchased  it  for  fifteen  hun- 
dred dollars.  It  was  marked  six  thousand  dollars  and 
put  on  sale  in  Marshall  Field's  art  gallery.  It  is  a 
standing  rule  of  this  art  gallery  to  resell  once  a  year 
all  their  purchases.  This  particular  painting  seemed 
unsalable.  It  was  reduced  and  reduced  for  a  number 
of  years,  but  it  could  not  be  sold.  Finally  a  picture 
speculator  bought  it  for  six  hundred  dollars,  took  it 
back  to  New  York,  sold  it  in  an  auction  sale  for  ten 
thousand  dollars.  The  picture  was  sold  and  resold 
eight  times  during  the  following  six  months  and  ulti- 
mately found  a  final  resting  place  in  the  mansion  of  a 
very  well-known  man  on  Fifth  Avenue.  He  paid  for 
it  one  hundred  and  eighty  thousand  dollars. 

Not  the  man  who  keeps  shops  and  stores  has  the 
great  adventure  in  seeking  after  the  old  and  antique. 
But  people  who  are  "picking  up  things,"  attending 
action  sales  here  and  there,  visiting  junk  shops  and 


INBOOKSHOPS  23 


second-hand  shops  all  over  the  city,  constantly  ex- 
pecting to  find  something  and  never  tired  or  disap- 
pointed. I  know  highly  educated  men  unusually  gift- 
ed, possessing  expert  knowledge  that  in  many  cases 
surpasses  the  "infallibility"  of  our  museum  authorities, 
who  prefer  the  free  life  of  buying  and  selling  to  high- 
priced  positions  in  art  shops  and  in  art  galleries.  I 
know  one  man  who  is  "picking  up"  a  living  by  looking 
through  the  book-stalls  of  dealers  and  buying  odd  vol- 
umes for  small  amounts  of  money  and  selling  the 
same  books  to  rare-book  dealers  for  as  many  dollars 
as  he  pays  cents. 


1917 


24  ADVENTURES 


Auctions  As  Amusement  Places 

REAL  enjoyment  of  life  is  caused  by  life's  con- 
trasts. And  what  greater  contrast  than  to  wit- 
ness Mrs.  Astor,  for  instance,  bidding  against  a 
second-hand  furniture  dealer  from  Second  Avenue  for 
a  curious  crazy-quilt,  soiled,  torn  and  catalogued  as 
genuine,  direct  from  some  old  farmhouse? 

Amusement?  Galore.  And  more  than  that.  Studies 
in  human  nature,  scale  exercises  of  human  passions. 
Everybody  has  his  chance  in  New  York  auction 
rooms.  The  gambler,  the  collector,  the  book  hunter, 
the  shrewd  dealer,  the  speculator,  the  bargain  fiend; 
these  auction  rooms  are  a  paradise  for  those  who 
know  their  own  wants,  needs  and  desires.  A  Dorado 
for  the  careful  and  cautious  who  have  taken  advan- 
tage of  the  exhibition  on  the  previous  day  who  have 
examined  the  articles  for  which  they  wish  to  bid,  who 
know  the  condition  of  the  offered  wares. 

But  these  auction  rooms  are  a  dangerous  play- 
ground for  the  emotional,  the  weak,  who  really  doesn't 
need  the  objects  on  sale,  whose  eyes  and  voice  seem 
to  miss  constantly  proper  telephonic  connections  with 
his  central,  his  seat  of  thinking.  Disastrous  prove 
these  auction  rooms  for  those  who  bid  without  seeing 
properly  what  they  are  bidding  for,  who  bid  higher 
and  higher  because  perhaps  they  do  not  want  the 
other  fellow  to  have  the  thing,  or  prompted  by  pure 
gambling  instinct. 

Fascinated  by  their  surroundings,  they  are  easily 
moved  to  action;  by  a  look  of  the  auctioneer,  by  a 
nod  or  a  word,  that  places  them  all  at  once  (though 
only  for  a  second)  in  the  limelight  of  public  atten- 
tion. They  pay  their  bills  and  do  not  know  what  to 
do  with  their  purchases.    What  a  comedy! 

Exactly  as  you  know  where  to  go  to  when  you  wish 
to  see  a  musical  comedy  or  an  opera,  so  do  I  know 
in  what  particular  auction  room  I  can  get  a  view  of 
human  vanity,  a  peep  at  greed,  an  exhibition  of  plain, 
delightful  collectors'  mania. 


INBOOKSHOPS  25 


"Follow  the  red  flag,"  I  would  have  almost  said,  but 
the  auctioneers  have  done  away  with  their  old  emblem 
during  their  recent  convention  in  Rochester.  Red 
flags  nowadays  are  supposed  to  symbolize  revolution, 
socialism,  brotherhood  of  men,  an  equal  chance  for 
all,  and  their  display  is  prohibited  by  city  and  State 
legislation.  Therefore,  blue  is  now  the  auctioneer's 
color,  and  you  must  follow  the  blue  flag. 

The  auctioneers  themselves  are  wonderful  enter- 
tainers, psychologists  of  the  first  rank:  Virtuosos,  who 
play  wonderful  tunes  on  the  emotions  of  their  audi- 
ence; golden  tunes,  tunes  that  turn  into  gold  in  the 
auction-room  proprietor's  pockets. 

"Something  for  nothing"  is  ever  attractive.  There 
wasn't  an  American  born  yet  who  would  not  stop, 
look  and  listen  at  the  word  "bargain." 

But  then  there  is  a  mystery  back  of  it  all.  You 
don't  know  where  the  things  come  from.  They  are 
jumbled  together  in  the  picturesqueness  of  every-day 
life;  a  painting  by  an  old  master  may  be  followed  by 
an  iron  bedstead  that  only  yesterday  harbored  the 
maid  of  some  bankrupt  actress.  Napoleon  is  supposed 
to  have  dined  from  one  of  the  offered  china  plates, 
and  a  much-worn  fur  coat  is  oflFered  ten  minutes  later. 

I  love  auction  rooms  without  catalogues,  without 
plush  chairs,  where  specialists  have  not  been  allowed 
to  separate  the  goats  from  the  sheep. 

"Finds"  are  rare  in  our  times  when  every  grocer's 
wife  who  inherited  a  library  from  her  great  uncle,  the 
preacher,  knows  more  about  auction-room  prices  than 
the  average  collector  of  books;  when  every  push-cart 
peddlar  examines  his  ill-smelling  day's  collection  for 
antiques. 

Books  and  works  of  art  have  become  objects  of 
speculation.  Daily  papers  are  the  sources  of  informa- 
tion on  the  prices  of  values  in  auction  rooms  as  well 
as  on  bonds  sold  on  the  stock  exchange.  And  still 
bargains  are  found  almost  daily.  Little  fortunes  are 
made  by  buying  things  in  an  auction  room  on  Uni- 
versity Place  and  selling  them  in  another  one  on  up- 
per Fifth  Avenue. 


26  ADVENTURES 


Here  is  a  little  amusement  calendar  for  lonely  after- 
noons: 

Do  you  want  to  see  splendid  gowns,  magnificent 
jewels,  society  manners,  etchings  of  priceless  value, 
paintings,  sold  for  thousands  of  dollars  by  the  square 
inch?  Witness  Mr.  Kirby's  performance  at  the  Ameri- 
can Art  Galleries.  He  is  a  dignified  gentleman:  never 
talks  above  a  whisper:  very  discreet  in  advice,  but 
irresistibly  urgent  in  his  discreetness.  A  magnetic 
fluid  seems  to  emanate  from  him,  and  he  has  the 
power  to  direct  it  properly — believe  me! 

But  what  an  education  to  see  the  great  works  of 
great  artists  put  up  for  public  sale:  Whistler,  Zorn, 
Degas,  Corot,  the  greatest — and  how  wonderful  to 
think  that  they  will  find  an  honored  place  in  so  many 
American  homes.  And  the  books!  Rows  of  wonder- 
ful bindings  and  old  yellowish  tomes  with  broken 
backs.  Rich  and  poor  have  an  equal  chance;  and 
money  does  not  always  acquire  the  most  precious,  the 
most  coveted  prize.  Money  usually  searches  for  out- 
ward beauty;  real  value  is  left  unobserved  in  a  shabby 
garment.  This  is  the  consolation  of  the  bookworm, 
but  dealers  spoil  his  chances  now-a-days.  They  have 
learned  that  it  pays  to  put  beautiful  clothes  on  val- 
uable books. 

Would  you  like  to  see  an  actor  of  the  old  type? 
Drop  in  on  Mr.  Hartmann,  in  the  Fifth  Avenue  Auc- 
tion Rooms  on  Fourth  Avenue.  Listen  to  his  good- 
natured  talk: 

"Madam,  you  ought  to  buy  this  divan,"  he  urges  an 
undecided,  elderly  lady,  who  perhaps  lives  somewhere 
in  the  Bronx,  in  a  little  flat  and  wonders  how  she 
could  get  the  monstrous  divan  into  her  tiny  living 
room.  "Let  me  advise  you  to  take  it,"  Hartmann 
continues.  "You  will  never  have  another  chance  at 
such  a  magrnificent  piece  of  furniture.  If  I  wouldn't 
have  bought  one  last  week  I  surely  would  keep  it  for 
myself."  Or,  he  would  lift  up  some  old  Steins:  "I 
take  any  bid  for  these  things,"  and  he  would  give  his 
audience  to  understand  how  hard  he  is  hit  by  prohi- 
bition.   He  knows  the  dealers  among  his  audience. 


IN    BOOK    SHOPS  27 


"All  right,  if  you  don't  want  to  bid  any  more  I  will 
knock  it  down  to  one  of  the  dealers  who  will  take  it 
to  his  shop  and  sell  it  to  you  at  an  exorbitant  profit," 
is  his  remark  when  he  cannot  get  the  people  interested 
in  some  object  or  another.  Every  dealer  has  a  nick- 
name with  him.  There  is  a  second-hand  furniture 
man  from  Baxter  Street,  whom  he  calls  General 
Darrow,"  much  to  the  delight  of  the  old  gentleman 
who  does  not  look  like  a  general  at  all.  Then  there  is 
another  one,  a  very  studious  looking  man,  whom  he 
calls  "Doctor."  Everbody  in  the  audience  really 
thinks  the  purchaser  is  a  doctor  and  a  collector  of 
valuables.  He  is  a  jovial  man  who  makes  you  feel  at 
home.  A  sort  of  old-fashioned  cabaret  performance. 
Everybody  seems  to  take  part  in  the  show. 

If  you  would  like  to  see  a  "dandy,"  who  feels  one 
with  the  best  of  his  listeners,  whom  he  wishes  to  make 
out  society  people  of  the  highest  order,  listen  to  Mr. 
Clark  on  Forty-fifth  Street,  near  Fifth  Avenue.  His 
is  a  society  play  with  an  everlasting  ripple  of  shallow 
laughter  on  the  surface.  The  auctioneer  speaks  with 
a  broad  English  accent,  makes  little  bows  every  once 
in  a  while,  and  his  right  hand  reaches  instinctively  for 
an  invisible  monocle.  I  always  wonder  if  he  really 
wears  one.  And  he  sells  things.  Every  one  has  his 
own  methods.  But  he  is  a  sort  of  "bon  vivant"  on 
the  stage  of  New  York  auctions. 

Would  you  like  to  see  an  old-time  Broadway  com- 
edy and  an  actor  with  a  manner  that  was  in  style 
forty  years  ago?  Would  you  like  to  listen  to  well-set 
flowery  speeches?  Get  acquainted  with  Mr.  Silo  and 
his  auction  rooms  on  Vanderbilt  Avenue,  near  Forty- 
sixth  Street.  He  wears  a  cut-away  and  a  goatee.  He 
has  the  distinction  of  having  auctioned  off  during  the 
past  forty  years  a  greater  part  of  the  contents  of  many 
Knickerbocker  Mansions.  He  seems  to  love  each  and 
every  article  that  comes  before  his  auction  table. 
Everything  is  "exquisite,  beautiful,  grandiose,  mag- 
nificent, stately."  He  looks  in  the  ecstasies  of  an 
overjoyed  connoisseur  at  his  paintings  and  drawings. 
He   interjects  once  in  a  while  his   sorrow  that   Mr. 


28  ADVENTURES 


Astor  is  not  alive  any  more,  who  would  have  appre- 
ciated at  once  this  or  that  painting.  After  such  ex- 
clamations, he  looks  with  sad  contempt  over  his  audi- 
ence, shakes  his  head  as  though  he  wanted  to  say: 
"You  poor  simps,  you  do  not  appreciate  real  art,"  He 
constantly  urges:  "Don't  buy  this,  don't  buy  it,  please 
don't  buy  it.  You  will  do  me  a  favor  if  you  do  not 
buy  it,  because  next  week  such  and  such  a  millionaire 
collector  from  California  will  be  in  town  and  he  will 
pay  me  a  far  greater  price  than  you  intend  to  offer." 

To  emphasize  his  sincerity  at  least  once  during  each 
sale,  he  would  get  up  from  his  seat,  stand  erect  with 
the  solemnity  of  a  preacher  and  declare:  "If  you  are 
sorry  to  have  purchased  this  article,  please  return  it 
to  me.  I  am  forty  years  in  the  auction  business;  my 
word  is  as  good  as  a  bond  and  I  will  return  the 
money."  And  he  makes  good;  at  least  he  made  good 
to  me.  In  the  folly  of  the  minute  I  bought  something 
that  I  had  no  earthly  use  for.  I  told  him  so  and  a 
couple  of  days  later  he  refunded  my  purchasing  price. 

What  wonderful  tales  could  the  hundreds  often 
thousands,  of  gowns,  wraps,  dresses,  suits,  slippers, 
stockings,  lingerie,  furs,  hats,  gloves  and  many  other 
intimate  garments  of  pretty  women  tell,  if  they  had 
voices  to  speak  while  they  hang  in  long  rows  in  Mr, 
Flatau's  auction  rooms  on  University  Place. 

Twice  a  week  he  conducts  an  auction  of  ladies' 
wearing  apparel.  Do  not  think  that  poor  people  go 
there  to  buy  cheap,  second-hand  dresses;  that  they 
slip  in  shyly,  shame-facedly,  make  their  purchase  and 
disappear  into  their  own  somewhere  in  New  York. 
Ladies  with  limousines  waiting  outside  bargain  for 
and  buy  evening  gowns,  while  shop-girls  purchase 
impossible  dresses.  Here  you  can  learn  in  one  hour 
more  about  the  tastes  of  America's  broad  masses  than 
in  all  the  museums,  art  institutions,  shops  and  ex- 
hibitions over  town.  The  grotesque  seems  to  hit  old 
and  young,  beautiful  and  ugly,  slender  and  fat.  The 
color  schemes  scream  to  the  heavens.  If  an  invisible 
power  would  grant  me  the  fulfillment  of  one  wish  I 
would  ask  the  good  fairy  who  would  make  me  the 


IN    BOOK    SHOPS  29 


offer:  "Please  let  all  these  women  that  were  in  Fla- 
tau's  auction  rooms  last  Friday  wear  the  clothes  they 
bought  there  and  assemble  them  for  me  in  the  ball- 
room of  the  Vanderbilt  Hotel."  It  would  be  an  unfor- 
gettable sight. 

And  because  you  were  in  Flatau's,  drop  into  Koli- 
ski's,  across  the  street. 

The  East  Sider  is  very  strongly  represented  in  his 
back  rooms,  while  in  the  front,  the  art  dealers  and 
peripatetic  gentlemen  dealers  bargain  for  everything 
under  the  sun  that  you  can  imagine.  Marble  lions 
that  stood  in  front  of  a  library  in  East  Oshkosh  are 
sold  with  the  same  nonchalance  as  the  slippers  that 
are  supposed  to  have  been  worn  by  Martha  Washing- 
ton during  a  reception  given  to  Lafayette.  Stately 
furniture  from  gambling  dens  is  offered  immediately 
after  a  series  of  undertaker's  outfits  had  been  sold. 

Koliski's  is  a  grreat  exchange  of  all  antique  dealers 
in  New  York,  as  well  as  second-hand  dealers.  Here 
the  bids  go  up  a  quarter  at  a  time.  Human  emotions 
are  voiced  unrestricted  by  polite  considerations.  Here 
is  the  atmosphere  of  an  old-fashioned  arena. 

1917 


30  \    \  ADVENTURES 


The  Strange  Dbcovery  and  Disappearance 
of  Stuart's  Washington 

ANTIQUE  shops  are  isles  of  romance  and  mys- 
tery in  the  commonplace  everyday  life  of  New 
York,  but  if  you  wish  to  enter  into  the  real  thrill 
of  adventure,  you  must  forget  the  fashionable  shop, 
where  antiques  have  found  a  temporary  resting  place 
and  you  must  not  talk  to  the  shop-keeper.  Antique 
shops  along  Fifth  Avenue  and  the  main  streets  are 
conducted  as  up-to-date  business  places,  and  up-to- 
date  business  has  a  romance  of  its  own,  a  twentieth 
century  romance  that  has  little  to  do  with  the  indi- 
vidual and  less  with  sacred  time-honored  traditions 
that  touch  the  heart.  Most  antique  dealers  kill  the 
charm  their  curios  and  works  of  art  awaken  in  us. 

They  know  the  prices  of  the  beautiful  and  ugly 
things  on  sale  in  their  shops,  but  they  don't  know 
their  value.  Antique  dealers  are  painful  whenever  they 
try  to  impress  you  with  their  knowledge  of  art  or  of 
association  or  history,  or  when  they  simply  play  on 
the  vanity  of  prospective  customers,  telling  in  whose 
possession  the  priceless  object  has  been,  quoting 
prices  like  stock  brokers. 

Whenever  I  spend  some  time  in  an  antique  shop  I 
think  of  George  Bernard  Shaw's  essay:  "On  Going  to 
Church":  "What  wonderful  and  ideal  places  would 
churches  be  if  there  were  no  priests  and  no  services 
to  disturb  the  sublime  quiet  and  the  elevating  beauty 
of  the  edifices."  What  charming  places  for  dreams 
and  revery  would  antique  shops  be  if  there  were  no 
antique  dealers  and  no  ambitious  millionaires,  who 
wish  to  show  their  appreciation  of  art  by  paying  ex- 
orbitant prices  for  art  objects. 

"Then  the  museum  is  an  ideal  place,"  I  hear  you 
say.  No,  it  isn't.  The  museum  is  a  mausoleum  of 
art.  The  art  objects  there  seem  to  me  buried  forever 
in  costly  catacombs  with  beautiful  monuments  and 
tombstones,  but  buried  away   from   our  world,   sep- 


INBOOKSHOPS  31 


arated  from  life  forever;  yet  the  beautiful  things  done 
by  past  generations  should  be  a  part  of  our  own 
throbbing  life. 

The  great  antique  dealers  are  not  the  high-priests 
of  the  beautiful  in  New  York.  Suave  and  well-mean- 
ing gentlemen;  their  words  come  not  from  their  hearts 
and  their  love  is  tied  to  the  price  of  their  wares  and 
not  to  their  merit.  Some  of  these  gentlemen  have 
sold  shoes,  shirts,  furniture  and  cash  registers  before 
they  went  into  the  "antique  business."  Works  of  art 
are  mere  merchandise  to  them.  Money-changers  they 
are  in  the  temple,  but  the  temple  is  theirs,  too;  no  one 
ever  can  chase  them  out. 

"Names"  are  their  gods.  Authenticity  their  dogma. 
The  art  of  persuasion  their  greatest  asset.  To  find 
big  names  (names  that  bring  high  auction  prices)  is 
their  constant  desire  and  to  sell  these  names  to  the 
highest  bidder  at  fabulous  prices  is  their  daily  dream. 

What  do  I  care  who  painted  a  portrait?  Perhaps  it 
is  a  priceless  Velasquez  or  Rubens  or  Botticelli  or  by 
some  unknown  artist  of  several  hundred  years  ago? 
But  I  like  to  contemplate  the  person  who  sat  for  the 
portrait;  the  beautiful  girl  in  her  strange  attire;  I  like 
to  dream  about  the  love,  hatred,  contempt,  affection, 
about  all  the  hopes  and  all  the  despair  mutely  wit- 
nessed by  some  old-fashioned  writing  cabinet  with 
secret  drawers  and  dozens  of  pigeon-holes,  where  once 
letters  reposed  that  meant  so  much  to  the  writers  and 
recipients.  I  like  to  think  of  the  soft,  well-cared-for 
hands  of  some  Prince  of  the  church,  who  wore  the 
beautiful  Bishop's  ring  hundreds  of  years  old  that  will 
adorn  perhaps  tomorrow  the  jewel-case  of  an  Ameri- 
can millionairess. 

There  are  divans  and  chairs.  .  .  .  Who  used  them? 
In  whose  home  have  they  served?  Where  will  they 
go  to  from  here?  The  mystery  and  romance  woven 
around  all  the  various  works  of  art  and  useful  objects 
that  have  withstood  the  destructive  powers  of  time 
and  men  is  captivating.  How  did  all  these  things  get 
into  the  fashionable  antique  stores? 

Most  of  them  were  purchased  from  other  antique 


32  ADVENTURES 


dealers;  some  were  bought  in  auctions  and  obscure 
places  and  a  few  were  purchased  from  another  kind  of  an- 
tique dealer  who  are  not  very  infrequent  in  New  York. 

Where  there  is  mystery  there  are  surely  people  who 
wish  to  solve  the  mystery,  and  very  curious  people  are 
these  "detectives  of  the  antique."  The  peripatetic 
antique  dealers  are  in  a  true  sense  connoisseurs.  They 
prowl  about  all  sorts  of  out-of-the-way  places;  stor- 
age houses,  auction  rooms,  in  garrets  of  houses  that 
will  be  torn  down  and  in  cellars  of  old  family  dwell- 
ings, unoccupied  perhaps  for  generations.  They  sense 
the  value  of  a  thing  the  moment  they  see  it.  Some 
of  them  are  scholarly  gentlerhen  who  have  a  great 
book  knowledge,  who  know  more  than  professors  in 
our  universities  and  curators  of  our  museums.  Others 
know  by  intuition.  And  a  few  have  the  instinct  of  a 
Sherlock  Holmes  and  the  sense  of  adventure  of  a  pirate. 

Some  weeks  ago  I  noted  the  following  advertise- 
ment in  the  American  Art  News.  It  sounded  myster- 
ious as  well  as  promising: 

WARNING! 
The  Original  Sketch  of  the  Head 

for  the 
Lansdowne  Full  Length 
All  Collectors,  Museums,  Dealers  and  other 
interested  parties  are  advised  to  take  no  part 
in  the  buying  or  selling  of  a  certain  oil  paint- 
ing:— 

Portrait  of 
Washington,  by  Gilbert  Stuart 
This  portrait  head  is  entirely  my  persqnal 
property.  It  is  now  being  held  by  a  certain 
party  without  my  consent,  who  refuses  to  re- 
turn it  to  me.  I  wish  to  warn  anyone  inter- 
ested that  the  present  holder  of  it  has  not  my 
permission  to  negotiate  its  sale  and  that  he 
cannot  deliver  title. 

Very  respectfully, 

J.    F.    MacCARTHY. 
339  Lexington  Ave.,  N.  Y.  City. 


INBOOKSHOPS  33 


Any  portrait  by  Gilbert  Stuart  is  worth  from  ten 
thousand  dollars  up.  That  there  should  be  a  new  dis- 
covery of  a  Gilbert  Stuart  painting,  especially  one  of 
George  Washington,  was  a  great  surprise  to  me.  And 
I  know  J.  F.  MacCarthy.  He  is  one  of  those  ideal 
antique  dealers  who  could  not  help  being  one. 
Of  course  he  sells  the  paintings,  engravings  and 
etchings  he  discovers,  but  I  am  sure  he  would  pre- 
fer to  keep  them  if  circumstances  did  not  compel  him 
to  earn  a  living,  even  as  you  and  I.  MacCarthy  is  a 
well-known  figure  in  auction  rooms  all  over  town.  He 
is  well  known  down  on  Fourth  Avenue,  where  old 
clothes,  damaged  shoes,  cheap  furniture  is  sold,  to- 
gether with  works  of  art,  tapestries,  paintings,  as  well 
as  in  those  fashionable  auction  rooms  on  Fifth  Avenue 
and  Madison  Avenue,  which  look  like  the  orchestra  of 
a  theatre,  where  the  visitors  sit  in  comfortable  plush 
chairs. 

On  Fourth  Avenue,  the  auctioneers  urge  the  people 
to  buy,  use  all  the  tricks  of  their  much-maligned  trade 
to  bring  up  the  price  a  quarter  of  a  dollar  at  a  time. 
In  the  fashionable  parts  of  the  city,  the  auctioneers 
are  well-posed  orators  who  seem  to  beg  the  crowds 
not  to  buy  because  they  will  get  so  much  better  prices 
tomorrow  or  the  day  after  tomorrow.  These  auction- 
eers are  studies  in  themselves.  At  any  rate  they  are 
excellent  psychologists.  And  MacCarthy  is  their 
great  friend.  He  knows  perhaps  more  than  they  do. 
He  gives  them  valuable  pointers  and  he  is  such  a 
pleasant  chap  to  talk  to  because  he  knows  stories  and 
tells  them  well. 

So  I  went  up  to  his  shop,  which  really  is  not  a  shop 
but  a  sort  of  connoisseur's  den,  and  asked  him  about 
the  "ad"  he  inserted.  "Tell  me  about  it,"  I  cried. 
"Was  the  picture  stolen  from  you?  How  did  you  ever 
get  hold  of  a  real  Gilbert  Stuart?  How  long  have  you 
had  it?  Why  didn't  you  ever  show  it  and  where  is  it 
now?" 

MacCarthy  is  rather  slow  in  his  movements  and  in 
his  speech.  He  settled  himself  comfortably  in  an  old 
Chippendale  chair,  supposed  to  have  been  owned  by 


34  ADVENTURES 


General  Beauregarde,  and  began  in  his  epic  manner: 

"You  did  see  the  picture.  I  had  it  almost  eight 
years.  I  had  it  long  before  I  moved  to  Lexington 
Avenue.  I  bought  it  at  the  James  Sutton  sale.  It 
was  catalogued  as  a  painting  by  Wertmuller,  supposed 
to  represent  George  Washington.  Wertmuller  was 
a  Swiss  painter  of  fame,  who  came  to  this  country 
about  1790.  Washington  sat  for  him  and  later  on  he 
made  several  copies  of  the  original  portrait.  His  pic- 
ture evidently  didn't  interest  the  public  very  much 
during  that  sale  and  I  bought  it  for  little  money.  I 
had  it  in  the  shop  for  years.  Many  people  looked  at 
it,  but  not  one  seemed  to  pay  any  attention  to  it.  It 
was  not  a  good  painting  of  Washington;  the  likeness 
was  rather  poor  and  the  whole  thing  looked  unfinished. 

"One  afternoon  last  year  I  was  looking  for  some 
painting  in  my  attic  and  there  I  ran  across  the  Wash- 
ington portrait.  I  took  it  downstairs  to  this  room, 
where  we  are  now  sitting.  I  looked  at  it  for  a  good 
long  while,  perhaps  for  the  first  time  since  I  had 
bought  it,  and  it  struck  me  as  strange  that  Wertmul- 
ler should  have  painted  Washington's  eyes  as  brown, 
when  everybody  knows  that  Washington  had  blue 
eyes.  The  paint  seemed  very  heavy  in  certain  spots 
and  the  idea  struck  me  that  the  whole  portrait  had 
been  overpainted;  I  took  a  little  solvent,  touched  up 
the  eyes  and  you  can  imagine  how  astonished  I  was 
to  see  that  the  color  came  oflF. 

"I  was  very  careful,  of  course,  but  my  interest  was 
aroused.  I  spent  the  whole  afternoon  removihg  the 
paint  from  the  eyes.  My  work  was  rewarded.  Beau- 
tiful blue  eyes  were  beneath  the  coat  of  paint.  I 
tried  the  solvent  on  other  parts  of  the  picture  and 
soon  I  found  that  the  whole  canvas  had  been  over- 
painted.  In  the  course  of  a  week  I  had  removed  the 
entire  coat  of  overpaint  and  beneath  it  was  an  entire- 
ly different  painting. 

"It  was  a  beautiful  portrait  of  Washington,  but 
surely  not  the  work  of  Wertmuller.  I  spent  another 
week  cleaning  it  and  restoring  the  painting.  It  was 
unmistakably  Gilbert  Stuart,  but  it  was  entirely  un- 


INBOOKSHOPS  35 


like  any  other  Stuart  picture  of  Washington. 

"I  at  once  went  to  the  library  and  studied  the  work 
of  Stuart,  comparing  carefully  all  paintings  he  had 
ever  done  with  the  one  in  my  possession.  The  pose 
was  exactly  the  same  as  that  of  his  "Lansdowne"  por- 
trait. 

"Lord  Lansdowne  was  a  very  celebrated  connois- 
seur who  met  Gilbert  Stuart  during  the  artist's  so- 
journ in  London  and  commissioned  him  to  paint  a 
life-size  portrait  of  General  Washington  in  1796.  It 
is  a  matter  of  record  that  Gilbert  Stuart  executed  this 
order  under  grave  difficulties. 

"France  had  sent  innumerable  painters  to  Mt.  Ver- 
non to  paint  the  first  President  of  the  new  Republic. 
Hundreds  of  artists  from  all  parts  of  Europe  came  to 
America  in  order  to  paint  Washington  and  on  the 
strength  of  having  painted  Washington  to  receive 
commissions  from  the  first  families  of  America.  Wash- 
ington had  grown  tired  of  giving  sittings  to  all  these 
painters,  some  of  whom  were  really  great  artists,  but 
others  second-rate  craftsmen,  who  wished  to  build 
their  reputations  upon  a  Washington  portrait  painted 
from  life.  Gilbert  Stuart  begged  Washington  to  sit 
for  him  again,  but  Washington  had  sworn  off  once 
for  all.  Then  Stuart  used  his  influence  among  Wash- 
ington's friends  and  finally  Mrs.  Bingham,  a  great 
favorite  of  George  Washington  in  1796  and  also  a 
great  friend  of  the  artist,  succeeded. 

"The  following  letter  is  on  record  in  the  Library  of 
Congress : 

"Sir: — I  am  under  promise  to  Mrs.  Bingham  to  sit 
for  you  tomorrow  at  nine  o'clock,  and  wishing  to 
know  if  it  be  convenient  to  you  that  I  should  do  so, 
and  whether  it  shall  be  at  your  own  home  (as  she 
talked  of  the  State  House),  I  send  this  note  to  ask 
information.  I  am,  sir,  your  obedient  servant," 
"GEORGE  WASHINGTON." 

"Monday  evening,  11th  April,  1796." 

"Stuart  describes  in  a  letter  to  Mrs.  Bingham, 
Washington's  visit  to  his  studio.    The  great  man  was 


36  ADVENTURES 


nervous,  ill-tempered  and  considered  the  whole  thing 
an  imposition  upon  his  kindness." 

"I  give  you  an  hour,"  he  cried  after  entering  the 
studio.  "Tell  me  in  what  position  you  want  me  and 
do  your  work  quickly.  I  am  tired  and  I  want  to  get 
back  home." 

Washington's  nervousness  proved  contagious. 
Stuart  became  so  nervous  that  he  hardly  knew  what 
he  was  doing.  He  realized  that  he  never  could  induce 
Washington  to  sit  again,  so  he  took  a  canvas  and 
threw  in  hurriedly  Washington's  face  in  broad  strokes. 
He  had  set  all  his  hopes  upon  this  life-size  portrait. 
He  had  made  arrangements  with  a  steel  engraver  to 
have  the  portrait  engraved.  He  knew  that  every- 
body would  buy  a  good  portrait  of  Washington  and 
that  his  success  would  not  only  crown  his  achieve- 
ment as  an  artist  but  also  make  him  financially  inde- 
pendent for  the  rest  of  his  life. 

He  made  a  color  sketch  of  Washington's  features 
as  well  as  he  could.  It  was  a  short  sketch  of  the 
head.  Later  on  he  engaged  three  different  men  to 
pose  for  the  full  length  of  the  body.  The  Library  of 
Congress  retains  the  correspondence  of  Gilbert  Stuart 
with  Martha  Washington,  who  loaned  him  a  complete 
wardrobe  of  her  husband,  her  husband's  sword  and 
cape,  to  be  worn  by  the  models. 

Stuart's  portrait  not  only  pleased  Lord  Lansdowne 
but  it  became  the  portrait  of  General  Washington. 
The  steel  engravings  in  life  size  were  sold  out  the 
very  week  that  they  had  been  struck  off.  Millions 
of  copies  circulated  all  over  the  world.  But  the  orig- 
inal sketch  of  the  head  was  lost.  Almost  every  work 
as  well  about  Gilbert  Stuart  as  about  George  Wash- 
ingrton's  portrait  contains  the  notice  that  the  original 
sketch  in  colors  of  Lansdowne  has  been  lost. 

"My  picture  was  that  very  sketch.  I  proved  it  con- 
clusively. It  would  lead  too  far  to  tell  you  about 
the  months  of  detective  work  I  put  in  tracing  back 
the  proprietors  of  this  painting  for  the  last  one  hun- 
dred and  fifty  years.  I  was  successful,  and  of  course 
you  can  imagine  how  much  the  painting  is  worth. 


IN    BOOK    SHOPS  37 


"One  day  a  well  known  art  dealer  of  Philadelphia 
strolled  into  my  shop  and  I  told  him  the  story  as  I 
have  told  it  to  you. 

"  *I  will  sell  the  picture  for  you,'  he  said,  'Give  me 
50  per  cent  commission  and  I'll  sell  it  quickly,* 

"I  knew  the  man;  he  had  sold  very  valuable  paint- 
ings in  the  past.  In  fact,  everybody  in  the  art  world 
knows  him.  I  simply  cried:  'Go  to  it!  Get  me  the 
best  price  that  you  can  get.' 

"He  took  the  picture  along  with  him  and  that  is  the 
last  I  ever  heard  of  it.  I  let  the  matter  rest  for 
several  months  and  then  wrote  him  a  letter  requesting 
the  return  of  the  picture. 

"His  astounding  answer  came  back:  He  claimed  to 
be  half  owner  of  the  painting;  as  I  had  let  him  in  on 
the  50  per  cent  profit-sharing  basis  he  refused  to  give 
up  the  painting. 

"I  went  to  my  lawver  and  my  lawyer  told  me:  'You 
are  stung.  That  gentleman  certainly  did  you.  There 
are  only  two  ways  of  action  open  for  you.  You  either 
sue  him  for  the  value  of  the  picture;  no  doubt  you 
will  get  a  judgment,  but  I  doubt  whether  you  will  ever 
be  able  to  collect  on  the  judgment.  And  the  minute 
that  you  sue  for  the  money,  you  abandon  automatical- 
ly your  proprietary  rights  to  the  painting.  If  you 
would  know  where  the  painting  is  you  could  replevin 
it.' " 

"But  do  you  know  where  it  is?" 

"I  didn't  at  the  time.  Finally  this  gentleman  of 
Philadelphia  made  me  a  proposition  to  put  the  paint- 
ing on  sale  in  one  of  the  most  prominent  art  galleries 
of  New  York,  who  specialize  in  historic  paintings  and 
in  old  masters. 

"The  proposition  was  to  pay  this  art  dealer  a  com- 
mission of  20  per  cent  of  the  prospective  purchase 
price.  This  proposition  made  me  suspicious.  It  would 
mean  20  per  cent  to  the  art  dealer;  40  per  cent  to  the 
man  of  Philadelphia.    Two  votes  against  my  one. 

"I  realized  that  I  was  helpless,  therefore  I  inserted 
the  advertisement.  I  at  least  wish  to  prevent  him 
and  his  helpers  to  get  the  reward  for  my  work,  for 


38  ADVENTURES 


my  discovery  and  all  the  pains  I  took  in  establishing 
the  identity  of  the  portrait." 

I  sympathize  with  MacCarthy.  I  wonder  where 
Gilbert  Stuart's  famous  painting  will  find  its  last  rest- 
ing place? 

1919 


INBOOKSHOPS  39 


In  New  York  Book  Shops 

EVERY  city  has  its  book  streets.  Book  shops  are 
gregarious, .  and  they  grow  like  mushrooms  in 
groups.  There  is  little  competition  in  the  book 
business.  No  matter  how  large  and  complete  the  stock 
of  a  second-hand  book  dealer  may  be,  his  neighbor's 
collection  will  be  quite  different.  The  clients  of  sec- 
ond-hand bookshops  like  to  "browse  about,"  they 
seldom  ask  for  a  certain  book,  and  they  love  to  have 
a  large  territory  in  which  to  hunt. 

The  location  of  book  streets  changes  with  the 
growth  of  a  city.  Seventy-five  years  ago  the  book 
centre  of  New  York  was  far  downtown  on  Ann 
Street;  after  the  Astor  Library  had  opened  its  doors. 
Fourth  Avenue  became  the  city  center  and  soon  was 
lined  with  picturesque  bookshops.  The  city  grew  and 
Twenty-third  Street  became  the  Dorado  of  the  book- 
hunter.  Then  people  began  to  make  immense  fortunes 
and  build  palaces  and  mansions  on  Fifth  Avenue, 
Central  Park  was  opened  to  the  public.  .  .  .and  Fifty- 
ninth  Street  became  the  book  street  of  New  York. 
Ever  further  the  city '  expanded.  Harlem  grew  in 
population  and  One  Hundred  and  Twenty-fifth  Street 
is  another  shopping  center  for  lovers  of  books  and 
objects  of  art.  ' 

Most  of  the  book  dealers  kept  step  with  the  times. 
They  moved  from  street  to  street.  The  grandfather 
had  been  prominent  on  Ann  Street,  the  son  on  Fourth 
Avenue,  and  the  grandson  flourishes  on  One  Hundred 
and  Twenty-fifth. 

Fourth  Avenue  has  come  to  honors  again  during 
the  past  four  years.  Some  big  book  dealers  had  the 
idea  to  move  back  to  old  "book-sellers'  row,"  new 
people  soon  gathered  around  them  and  today  most  of 
the  second-hand  book  business  of  the  United  States  is 
transacted  here  on  this  old  street,  surrounded  by  a 
ramshackle  neighborhood,  invaded  by  factory  build- 
ings and  sweatshops. 

But  some  book  dealers  could  never  make  up  their 


40  ADVENTURES 


minds  to  move.     They  stuck  to  their  shops.     They 
are  the  landmarks  of  New  York's  book  streets. 

The  Den  of  a  Pessimist 

The  Nestor  of  the  book  dealers  who  "have  re- 
mained" and  have  withstood  the  trend  of  the  times 
is  E.  A.  Custer  on  Fifty-ninth  Street.  Right  near 
Park  Avenue,  next  to  a  livery  stable  in  the  cellar  of 
an  old-fashioned  brownstone  house,  is  his  picturesque 
shop.  Large  bookstalls  with  hundreds  of  books  in- 
vite you  to  rummage  about,  quaint  paintings  and 
drawings  will  arrest  your  attention  and  make  you  stop 
even  if  you  are  in  a  hurry.  Firearms  of  all  descrip- 
tions, swords  and  shining  armor  add  a  war  touch  that 
seems  quite  appropriate  in  our  time.  If  you  look 
closer  you  see  a  pale  face  with  keen  black  eyes  behind 
the  show  window.  You  have  to  look  very  closely  in 
order  to  detect  it.  And  if  you  enter  the  store  you 
will  meet  the  proprietor  of  face  and  store,  sitting  at 
his  look-out,  watching  his  stalls,  scrutinizing  the  pass- 
ers-by who  stop  to  glance  at  his  wares.  He  continues 
in  his  position  while  he  is  talking  to  you;  he  never 
takes  his  eyes  from  his  treasures,  even  while  waiting 
on  a  customer,  or  delving  into  the  depths  of  his  shop. 

"I  have  to  watch  my  property,"  he  offers  as  ex- 
planation while  excusing  himself.  "I  am  listening  to 
what  you  say,"  he  adds,  "don't  mind  if  I  don't  look 
at  you  while  we  talk.  All  people  who  stop  out  there 
to  look  at  my  books  are  thieves,  and  if  I  give  them  a 
chance  to  get  away  with  my  books  they  prefer  to^  ac- 
quire them  that  way  rather  than  to  buy.  They  steal 
from  earliest  childhood  and  never  cease  until  they  are 
dead.  I  have  been  forty  years  in  this  very  place  and 
I  know  what  I  am  talking  about.  And  though  I  am 
as  watchful  as  a  dog,  I  lose  about  twenty  per  cent 
of  the  stock  that  I  put  in  my  stalls  through  thieving. 
All  book  collectors  are  thieves;  people  who  never 
would  think  of  taking  anything  else  without  paying 
for  it  must  think  a  bookshop  is  different  from  all  other 
stores.  Their  consciences  are  not  sin-stricken  if  they 
incidentally  slip  a  book  they  like  into  their  pocket  and 


INBOOKSHOPS  41 


walk  out  with  it.  I  have  long  ceased  to  read  books. 
I  read  human  nature  for  my  pastime. 

"There  is  not  a  day  that  I  do  not  lose  books  by 
theft.  Take  for  instance  last  week.  I  had  a  set  of 
Dickens  on  my  stands.  A  cheap  edition  on  the  table 
where  I  keep  books  for  boys.  I  saw  a  little  freckled, 
red-haired,  bare-footed  lad  inspecting  the  Dickens 
books  for  longer  than  half  an  hour.  Some  time  later 
he  came  back  and  looked  at  them  again.  This  time 
he  had  a  few  books  under  his  arm.  He  laid  his  books 
on  the  table  and  managed  very  cleverly  to  pick  them 
up  after  a  while  together  with  one  of  my  Dickens 
books.  The  boy  really  wanted  to  read  the  book  and 
I  let  him  get  away  with  it.  I  knew  that  he  was  pass- 
ing my  shop  every  day,  and  I  thought  of  speaking  to 
him  another  time. 

"The  next  day  he  came  again,  inspected  the  remain- 
ing volumes  of  my  Dickens  set  for  a  few  minutes,  re- 
peated his  trick  of  the  day  before  and  stole  another 
volume.  He  came  every  day  and  acquired  six  of  the 
seven  volumes.  It  was  only  on  Saturday  that  he  stole 
the  sixth  volume;  this  time  I  went  after  him,  told  him 
sternly  to  come  back  with  me,  handed  him  the  seventh 
volume  and  said  to  him: 

"  'Here,  my  boy,  I  don't  keep  open  on  Sunday,  and 
somebody  might  buy  this  one  and  spoil  your  set.  Bet- 
ter take  it  along.  You  have  the  right  spirit.  Continue 
and  one  of  these  days  you  will  find  yourself  a  mil- 
lionaire.    Perhaps  then  you  will  endow  libraries.' 

"Or  the  old  Irish  woman  whom  I  caught  only  yes- 
terday. She  came  with  a  basket  covered  with  news- 
papers, examined  my  books  very  carefully,  and 
dropped  every  once  in  a  while  one  of  the  books  in  her 
basket.  I  waited  until  the  basket  was  filled,  then  I 
told  her  to  come  inside  of  my  shop;  I  emptied  the 
basket  and  handed  it  back  to  her.  I  didn't  say  a 
word.     She  took  her  basket  and  went  outside. 

"Well-to-do-looking  men  come  in,  examine  books, 
tear  out  plates,  and  walk  out  again  without  buying  a 
penny's  worth  of  my  stock. 

"I   don't   think   they   are   all   bad   at   heart.     They 


42  ADVENTURES 


simply  don't  look  at  books  as  merchandise  and  if  they 
can  get  something  for  nothing,  they  take  it.  Women 
are  the  worst.  Especially  those  modern  women  who 
write  and  try  to  reform  humanity.  They  are  quite 
shameless  and  do  anything  as  long  as  there  is  a  slight 
chance  of  getting  away  with  it." 

"But,"  I  interjected,  "mustn't  it  be  dreadful  to  sit 
in  your  shop  day  after  day  as  a  sort  of  watchman?" 

"I'm  accustomed  to  it,"  he  answered,  "and  that's  the 
only  way :  I  can  make  my  business  pay.  It  was  not 
always  so.  There  was  a  time  when  people  really 
loved  books  and  bought  them  in  order  to  read.  Then 
they  had  time  to  read.  The  successful  man  of  today 
has  an  automobile,  has  to  go  out  joy-riding  after  busi- 
ness hours,  has  to  spend  his  time  in  cabarets  and  road- 
houses.  He  needs  books  only  as  decorations  when 
he  buys  a  hdme  or  furnishes  an  apartment.  And  then 
he  leaves  it  usually  to  his  decorator  to  choose  the 
most  attractive  and  expensive  bindings  in.  keeping 
with  the  color  scheme  of  his  library. 

"I  tell  you,  New  Yorkers  dont  know  books,  dont 
want  to  loiow  them.  The ;  men  read  newspapers,  the 
women  magazines,  and  the  young  people  trashy  nov- 
els. Of  course  there  are  our  modern, book  collectors. 
They  know  as  much  about  thd'  commercial  values  of 
books  as  I  do.  They  buy  books  as  an  investment, 
just  like  pictures.  They  folIoW:  the  auction  sales  and 
gamble  in  books.  You  can  hardly  call  such  people 
booklovers.  Thirty  years  ago  I  used  to  have  com- 
fortable chairs  in  my  shop  and  in  the  evening  big 
business  men,  lawyers,  and  physicians  would  drop  in 
and  examine  at  leisure  some  tomes  that  I  had  laid  be- 
fore them  because  I  knew  they  were  interested  in  this 
or  that  subject.  Today  most  of  the'  men  who  are  in- 
terested in  books  afe  so  poor  that  they  can  hardly  pay 
their  room  rent." 

And  then  he  proceeded  to  show  me  some  of  his 
treasures.  "Who  do  you  think  buys  this  sort  of  books 
in  our  day?  Dealers,  nobody  but  dealers.  And  they 
sell  them  again  to  dealers.     Finally  they  find  their 


INBOOKSHOPS  43 


way  into  the  auction  rooms  and  are  bought  again  by 
a  dealer." 

Mr.  Custer  has  traveled  all  over  Europe  and  is  a 
lover  of  beautiful  paintings.  Original  Corots,  Millets, 
original  drawings  by  Aubrey  Beardsley  lean  against 
piles  of  books,  ha9g  in  cobwebbed  corners.  "Are  you 
not  afraid  that  someone  will  steal  them?"  I  asked 
him,  commenting  on  his  carelessness. 

"They  don't  know  enough,"  was  his  answer.  "Some 
months  ago  I  had  a  wonderful  painting  of  Corot's  in 
the  show  window.  A  man  whom  I  knew  as  a  notor- 
ious miser  came  in  and  asked  if  it  was  genuine.  I  said 
in  a  matter-of-fact  way  that  I  have  no  proof  but  the 
picture,  and  that  I  would  sell  it  for  one  hundred  and 
twenty-five  dollars.  I  myself  had  paid  for  it  three 
thousand.  He  looked  at  it  for  a  long  time  and  then 
said  he  would  come  in  again.  The  following  day  he 
brought  his  wife  and  brother-in-law  to  look  at  it. 
They  examined  it  very  carefully  and  went  out.  The 
following  week  I  sent  the  painting  to  an  auction  sale 
where  it  realized  eight  thousand  eight  hundred  dol- 
lars, notwithstanding  the  bad  times  on  account  of  the 
war.  On  the  very  day  that  I  received  my  check  in 
payment  for  the  picture,  the  man  came  in  again  and 
proposed  to  buy  it  for  one  hundred  dollars.  I  showed 
him  the  check,  and  it  pleases  me  even  today  to  think 
how  disappointed  and  crestfallen  he  was;  because  I 
never  told  him  •  that  I  would  not  have  sold  him  the 
picture  even  if  he  had  given  me  a  hundred  and  twenty- 
five  dollars  at  the  time  I  ofifered  it  to  him. 

"I  have  my  worries,  but  I  also  have  a  lot  of  enjoy- 
ment watching  my  contemporaries  and  noting  their 
faults." 

Mr.  Custer  is  a  small  man  with  a  kindly  smile,  and 
after  I  saw  him  chatting  with  the  ragamuffins  swarm- 
ing around  his  bookstalls,  and  talking  kindly  to  a  girl 
who  wanted  some  information,  his  piercing  dark  eyes 
did  not  seem  so  very  misogynic  and  his  pessimism 
seemed  of  the  kind  of  the  dog  who  barks  but  does 
not  bite. 


44  ADVENTURES 


A  Whitman  Enthusiast 

Little  Max  Breslow,  who  isn't  taller  than  a  good- 
sized  doll  and  has  such  tiny  hands  that  he  can  hardly 
hold  two  books  at  the  same  time,  is  so  vivacious  and 
young  looking  that  everybody  must  like  him  if  for  no 
other  reason  than  his  continuous  smile.  He  is  the  last 
of  his  guild  on  Twenty-third  Street.  Max  sold  books 
since  his  earliest  youth;  he  sold  his  school  books. 
When  a  boy  he  used  to  go  about  "picking  up"  books 
and  selling  them  to  book  dealers;  he  started  in  as  ap- 
prentice in  an  out-of-the-way  bookshop  on  Eighth 
Avenue,  and  then  opened  up  the  cellar  which  he  has 
made  so  attractive  since. 

As  neighbors  he  had  the  potentates  of  the  second- 
hand book  market,  Mr.  Schulte  and  Mr.  Stammer, 
both  of  whom  have  moved  to  Fourth  Avenue  since, 
and  many  other  less  important  sellers  of  books  who 
have  dispersed  in  all  directions  during  these  latter 
years.  He  loves  Twenty-third  Street  and  intends  to 
stick  there  till  the  last  house  is  transformed  into  a 
factory.  You  almost  fall  into  his  shop  from  the  street, 
so  steep  are  the  stairs  and  tread-worn.  He  has  the 
instinct  of  the  born  second-hand  book  dealer  to  find 
out-of-the-way  books  on  out-of-the-way  subjects. 
There  is  always  something  unusual  in  his  shop  and  his 
prizes  are  within  the  reach  of  the  poor  man's  purse. 
He  likes  his  books  and  he  likes  to  sell  them  to  good 
homes.  And  therefore  he  often  fits  his  price  to  the 
purchaser's  purse.  His  hobby  is  Walt  Whitman.  He 
has  the  most  famous  collection  of  Whitman  items  in 
this  country,  even  larger  and  more  extensive  than  the 
one  Horace  Traubel  has  guarded.  He  has  original 
manuscripts  of  Whitman,  proof  sheets  of  his  books, 
everything  that  was  ever  written  in  any  language 
about  Walt  Whitman,  more  than  four  hundred  pic- 
tures of  the  "good,  gray  poet,"  and  you  couldn't  buy  one 
of  those  precious  things  for  any  money  in  the  world. 

An   Optomist 

Frank  Bender,  who  is  considered  at  present  one  of 
the  leading  second-hand  book  dealers  of  Fourth  Ave- 


INBOOKSHOPS  45 


nue,  and  that  means  of  the  United  States,  is  an  en- 
tirely self-made  man,  and  his  career  is  unique  even 
among  book  dealers.  Only  five  years  ago  he  started 
his  shop,  without  books,  without  money,  and  with- 
out knowledge.  In  a  short  time  he  acquired  all  these 
three  essentials,  and  here  is  his  own  story: 

"I  used  to  sell  books  to  architects  on  the  road, 
architectural  year-books  and  magazines,  and  later  I 
added  books  on  decorations  which  I  sold  to  deco- 
rators. It  occurred  to  me  one  day  that  I  could  save 
rent  if  I  opened  a  shop  where  I  could  sell  enough 
books  of  all  kinds  to  pay  expenses.  That  was  five 
years  ago.  I  signed  a  lease  for  a  little  one-story 
building  that  stood  where  the  new  post-office  on 
Fourth  Avenue  and  Thirteenth  Street  is  at  present.  I 
sold  enough  architectural  books  to  pay  my  first 
month's  rent  and  to  buy  lumber  to  fix  up  my  shop. 
I  literally  built  up  my  own  business.  I  laid  the  floors, 
built  the  shelves,  the  tables.  My  shelves  remained 
empty  because  I  had  no  money  to  buy  books.  One 
day  a  friendly  print  dealer  came  along  who  must  have 
taken  interest  in  and  pity  on  me.  "Why  don't  you 
hang  some  prints  around  your  shop  to  fill  out  the  wall 
spaces?"  he  asked.  "It  will  make  it  look  better,  I 
have  a  bunch  of  prints  I  will  sell  you  for  forty  dollars 
and  I'll  give  you  six  months'  time  in  which  to  pay  it." 

I  accepted  his  offer,  and  those  prints  netted  me  over 
five  hundred  dollars  in  a  surprisingly  short  time.  If  one 
keeps  a  bookshop  something  unusual  happens  almost 
every  day.  It  is  the  uncertainty  of  the  book  business 
that  always  attracts  me.  Of  course  every  book  dealer 
who  wants  to  make  a  decent  living  must  have  a  spe- 
cialty of  his  own.  Mine  is  architectural  books.  I  have  a 
large  clientele  of  architects  and  decorators;  I  know 
these  books  well,  and  they  were  the  backbone  of  my 
business.  Chance  and  good  luck  are  the  great  factors 
in  the  book  dealer's  life.  Let  me  tell  you  a  few  in- 
stances: 

"A  few  months  after  I  opened  my  shop  at  the  time 
of  the  big  auction  sales,  I  felt  very  gloomy.  Of 
course  I  needed  cash  in  order  to  buy  books,  and  I 


46  ADVENTURES 


did  not  have  it.  One  morning  one  of  my  best  cus- 
tomers walked  into  my  shop  and  asked  for  a  copy  of 
Canina's  Ancient  Rome.  I  told  him  that  the  book 
was  so  scarce  that  there  was  no  use  to  ask  for  it. 
'Well,'  he  said,  'I  am  willing  to  give  you  two  hundred 
and  fifty  dollars  for  it  any  time  you  bring  me  a  copy.' 
The  very  same  afternoon  I  noticed  a  copy  of  the  book 
in  an  auction  catalog  to  be  sold  the  next  day.  I  went 
to  the  auction  and  sat  there  shaking  like  a  leaf,  wait- 
ing for  the  first  bid  after  the  book  was  put  up.  No- 
body seemed  to  be  interested  to  buy  it.  Somebody 
bid  five  dollars,  and  I  got  it  finally  for  six  dollars  and 
seventy-five  cents.  I  had  it  wrapped  up,  took  it 
around  the  corner  to  my  customer  and  collected  two 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars.  That  was  the  first  real 
money  I  made,  and  it  gave  me  a  chance  to  acquire 
better  books. 

"Take  only  yesterday.  I  was  very  busy  writing 
when  a  man  who  introduced  himself  as  a  rag  paper- 
dealer,  oflFered  me  linen-bound  copies  of  a  historical 
encyclopedia  for  seven  and  a  half  cents  a  volume.  I 
didn't  even  want  to  spend  time  talking  to  him,  and  so 
I  declined  abruptly.  'I  have  many  thousands  of  these 
books,'  the  man  insisted,  'make  me  an  oflFer.'  He  went 
out  and,  strange  to  say,  came  back  in  a  half  hour  with 
a  cart-load  of  the  books  and  said  to  me,  'Here  they 
are.'  The  books  proved  good  sellers  and  I  made  a 
pile  of  money.  The  people  that  come  into  my  shop 
are  my  only  source  of  information.  They  all  tell  me 
what  they  know  about  the  books  they  are  interested 
in.  I  love  to  talk  to  them,  even  if  they  seem  to  be 
cranks.  No,  I  don't  mistrust  them.  They  are  welcome 
to  make  themselves  at  home  in  my  place.  I  believe 
that  everybody  that  enters  my  shop  is  just  as  honest 
and  straight  as  I  am  myself.  Only  once,  after  I  had 
lost  a  valuable  book  in  a  mysterious  way,  I  became 
suspicious.  I  was  busy  talking  to  some  customers  as 
a  man  entered  whose  looks  I  did  not  like.  He  busied 
himself  with  some  fashion  books  at  the  back  of  my 
store.  I  grew  so  nervous  about  him  that  I  approached 
him  quitQ  tQ^ghly  with  a  question,   'What  is  it  you 


INBOOKSHOPS  47 


are  looking  for?'  He  answered,  as  I  thought  guilt- 
ily, naming  the  title  of  a  certain  fashion  book  that  I 
happened  to  have  in  stock.  I  brought  it  out,  he  ex- 
amined it  and  asked  the  price.  It  was  seven  dollars 
and  fifty.  The  book  had  cost  me  five  dollars.  He 
said  that  he  could  not  pay  seven  fifty  for  the  book. 
'If  he  really  wants  to  buy  the  book,'  I  thought,  'and 
didn't  come  in  here  to  steal,  he  will  purchase  it  for 
three  fifty.'  I  firmly  believed  that  the  man  did  not 
have  ten  cents  in  his  pocket.  I  offered  the  book  for 
three  dollars  and  fifty  cents.  'At  this  price,  I  take  it,' 
he  answered.  I  lost  one  dollar  and  fifty  cents,  but 
regained  my  belief  in  humanity." 

A  Gambler 

On  Thirty-fourth,  near  Lexington  Avenue,  Jerome 
Duke  has  opened  a  bookshop  of  a  peculiar  sort.  It  is 
not  exactly  a  book  shop  because  there  are  antiques  and 
curiosities  all  over  the  place.  The  books  are  thrown 
together  topsy-turvy,  Latin  authors,  modern  novel- 
ists, theological  books,  old  French  tomes  and  German 
philosophers.  I  asked  the  proprietor  about  his  books 
and  his  answer  was: 

"I  don't  know  anything  about  them.  I  never  read 
books  and  would  not  be  bothered  with  them.  I  buy 
them  at  a  certain  price  and  I  try  to  sell  them  at  a 
profit.  In  fact,  I  intend  to  buy  anything  I  can  get 
cheap  enough,  no  matter  what  it  is.  I  went  into  the 
book  game  in  order  to  gamble  and  I  am  going  to 
gamble  on  anything  that  people  bring  in  here. 

"There  is  one  thing  I  have  just  refused  to  buy  be- 
cause the  man  wanted  too  much  for  it.  He  said  that 
he  had  recently  returned  from  Europe,  had  been  a 
soldier,  and  wanted  to  sell  me  the  embalmed  finger  of 
a  German  general.  I  forget  the  name  of  the  general, 
but  the  man  said  that  it  was  authentic  and  that  he 
would  sign  a  document  before  a  notary  public,  swear- 
ing that  he  had  been  present  at  the  time  the  finger  was 
cut  off  of  the  general's  hand.  Now,  if  he  had  asked 
fifty  cents  or  a  dollar,  I  would  have  been  willing  to 
take  a  chance,  because  it  would  make  a  good  window 


48  ADVENTURES 


display  in  this  time  of  war;  but  he  wanted  five  dollars, 
and  I  couldn't  see  my  war  clear.  That's  too  much  of 
a  chance,  to  stake  a  five-spot  on  an  embalmed  finger 
of  a  German  general.  So  I  bought  a  slipper  instead. 
It  belonged  to  a  Madame  Jumel,  and  she  is  supposed 
to  have  worn  it  on  the  day  that  she  got  her  divorce 
from  Aaron  Burr.  I  paid  a  dollar  for  it  and  I  consider 
it  a  pretty  sound  gamble." 

"How  so?"  I  asked. 

"Well,"  he  answered,"  because  Aaron  Burr  was  the 
second  Vice-President  of  the  United  States."  Of 
course  that  argument  was  final,  and  I  wished  him 
luck  with  his  purchase. 


1918 


IN    BOOK    SHOPS  49 


II. 

Strange  to  say,  most  of  the  bookshops  in  New  York 
with  individual  appeal  are  modern  places  only  re- 
cently established,  and  their  proprietors  young,  often 
very  young  people.  Most  of  them  are  up-to-date  busi- 
ness men  who  had  their  training  in  different  lines. 
They  were  lovers  of  books,  they  realized  the  possi- 
bilities of  a  "bookshop  with  a  soul,"  they  opened  shops 
after  their  own  hearts,  and  are  meeting  with  success. 

The  Oxford  Book  Shop 

Alfred  Goldsmith's  is  the  youngest  of  New  York's 
book  shops.  This  is  to  be  found  on  Lexington  Ave- 
nue near  Twenty-fifth  Street,  in  an  old-fashioned  base- 
ment, with  pillars  and  nooks,  near  some  of  the  oldest 
auction  rooms  in  the  city,  just  the  place  for  a  book 
shop. 

Shelves  all  around  the  walls  filled  with  a  few  thou- 
sand well-selected  books,  comfortable  chairs  to  sit  in 
here  and  there,  a  sacred  case  of  first  editions,  all 
other  books  well  dusted  and  in  neat  rows,  modern 
authors  mostly,  scarce  translations  of  authors  whose 
names,  perhaps,  you  have  never  heard  before,  but 
who  will  be  your  good  friends  when  once  you  have 
made  their  acquaintance. 

Mr.  Goldsmith  is  a  young  man,  a  college  graduate 
with  a  successful  business  career  in  the  print  paper 
industry  behind  him.  He  always  was  a  great  reader 
and  buyer  of  books.  One  day  this  fall  he  decided  to 
open  a  book  shop,  and  to  get  married.  He  did  both, 
and  is  well  satisfied  with  both  ventures. 

Book  collectors  are  gifted  with  a  sixth  sense.  It  is 
not  necessary  to  send  them  announcements.  Some 
day  they  are  sure  to  drift  in,  and  if  the  atmosphere 
is  congenial  they  come  again  and  again. 

"I  love  books,"  said  Mr.  Goldsmith,  who  is  a  great 
philosopher  and  an  excellent  talker.  "Book  selling  is 
a  game.  The  sort  of  books  I  am  selling  are  hard  to 
be  found,  and  quite  easy  to  sell.  My  great  pleasure 
is  to  go  about  town  picking  up  my  books.     Once  I 


so  ADVENTURES 


place  them  for  sale  on  my  shelves  they  quickly  go. 
It  is  wonderfully  interesting  to  observe  the  people 
that  come  in  here  to  buy  books.  Of  course  you  know 
all  about  the  peculiarities  of  collectors.  But  since  I 
have  opened  my  shop  I  have  discovered  some  new 
species  of  book  shop  habitues.  Let  me  tell  you  about 
them. 

"There  is  Mr.  Pimple,  a  big,  stout,  uncouth  man 
of  about  thirty,  who  looks  like  a  butcher  and  pretends 
to  be  a  highly  educated  lover  of  books.  His  specialty 
is  the  autograph  game.  He  writes  letters  to  living 
authors  which  read  something  like  this:  'In  a  treas- 
ured niche  of  my  favorite  book  shelf  in  my  library, 
is  a  volume  that  I  prize  more  than  any  other  book. 
It  is  your  novel.  You  would  earn  the  eternal  gratitude 
of  an  old  book  worm  if  you  would  have  the  goodness 
to  autograph  it  for  me.'  The  author  receives  the  let- 
ter and  imagines  some  old  devoted  book  crank,  auto- 
graphs the  copy,  and  returns  it  to  Mr.  Pimple  at  his 
(the  author's)  own  expense.  Mr.  Pimple  makes  the 
rounds  of  the  book  dealers  and  sells  his  treasured 
autograph  copy  to  the  highest  bidder.  Worse  than 
that,  he  throws  the  very  letter  which  he  received  from 
the  author,  promising  the  book,  into  the  bargain. 
Gertrude  Atherton,  Richard  Le  Gallienne,  Katie 
Douglas  Wiggins  and  many  others  have  autographed 
whole  sets,  forty  and  fifty  books  at  one  time,  for  Mr. 
Pimple,  who  went  so  far  as  to  take  advance  orders 
for  such  sets. 

"How  little  he  really  thinks  of  the  authors  to  whom 
he  sends  his  stock  admiration  letter  the  following 
story  evidences:  One  day  he  asked  me  if  eight  books 
of  Upton  Sinclair,  first  editions,  would  bring  good 
money  if  autographed  by  the  author.  I  answered  in 
the  affirmative.  Pimple  looked  up  the  address  of 
Sinclair,  wrote  him,  received  a  favorable  reply  and 
found  that  it  would  cost  forty  cents  to  send  the  books 
by  parcel  post  to  Pasadena,  Cal.  'Too  much  money,' 
he  remarked.  He  tore  out  the  fly  leaves,  sent  them 
on,    Mr.    Sinclair   autographed    them,    Pimple    pasted 


IN    BOOK    SHOPS  .  51 


them  carefully  back  into  the  books  and  sold  the  whole 
set  on  the  very  day. 

"But  the  best  trick  was  the  one  he  put  over  on  the 
publishers  of  Ambrose  Bierce.  After  Bierce's  disap- 
pearance, collectors  were  hot  after  his  first  editions 
and  autographs.  Bierce's  publishers  had  a  good  many 
letters  and  presented  one  to  each  purchaser  of  the 
author's  collected  works.  Mr.  Pimple  paid  them  a 
visit,  talked  for  more  than  an  hour  of  his  admiration 
for  Bierce,  mentioned  once  or  twice  that  circum- 
stances did  not  permit  him  to  purchase  one  of  the 
sets,  and  finally  declared  that  the  ambition  of  his  life 
was  to  own  a  letter  in  the  handwriting  of  'the  greatest 
writer  and  artist  in  the  world.'  The  sincere  enthus- 
iasm of  Pimple,  his  insistence,  the  pleading  of  poverty, 
finally  induced  the  publisher  to  give  him  a  short  letter 
of  Ambrose  Bierce  as  a  gift. 

"  'I  will  never  part  with  this  treasure.  I  will  al- 
ways carry  it  in  my  portfolio,  near  my  heart,'  were 
his  parting  words.  He  came  directly  to  my  shop  and 
told  me  the  story.  We  were  talking  about  Bierce  as  a 
customer  entered  and  soon  took  a  hand  in  the  con- 
versation. 'I'd  like  to  get  a  letter  of  Bierce,'  he  ex- 
plained. 'I  would  be  willing  to  pay  seven  dollars  and 
a  half  for  a  short  note  in  his  hand.' 

"I  hardly  believed  my  eyes!  Mr.  Pimple  took  out 
his  portfolio  from  near  his  heart  and  offered  his  treas- 
ured letter  of  Bierce  for  the  seven  dollars  and  a  half. 

"This  man  is  known  to  every  rare  book  dealer  in 
the  city.  And  he  isn't  the  only  one  of  his  clan.  He 
is  tolerated  because  he  produces  inscribed  copies  of 
authors  that  are  hard  to  get. 

"Then  there  are  the  habitual  book  thieves,  whom 
I  love  to  watch.  I  once  had  an  occasion  to  do  a 
friendly  turn  to  one  of  these  gentlemen  who  are  on 
our  blacklist.  He  calls  himself  Van  Southall,  and  in 
an  outburst  of  gratitude  he  made  the  following  con- 
fession: 'I  like  you.  Goldsmith.  You  don't  need  to 
be  afraid  of  me.  I'd  never  take  anything  in  your  shop. 
It  is  quite  diflferent  with  other  dealers.  Why  shouldn't 
I  take  advantage  of  them.    If  I  can  slip  something  in 


52  ADVENTURES 


ray  pocket  it  is  my  own  business  and  their  lookout. 
But  you  can  feel  quite  safe.  I  know  that  you  are 
an  ambitious  young  man  who  loves  books  and  I 
should  never  harm  you.' 

Mr.  Goldsmith  reads  a  great  deal,  books  as  well  as 
human  nature.  He  rarely  makes  a  mistake  in  sug- 
gesting books  to  his  clients.  He  likes  people  who 
write  books,  he  likes  their  personality,  and  no  author 
can  find  a  better  apostle  than  Mr.  Goldsmith,  provided 
he  is  congenial.  If  you  wish  to  know  what  authors 
Mr.  Goldsmith  does  not  like,  look  at  his  ten-cent 
stand  in  front  of  the  shop.  Extraordinary  values  can 
be  had  there  for  one  dime,  because  Mr.  Goldsmith 
does  not  like  the  books. 

Washington  Square  Book  Shop 

Just  a  while  before  the  time  when  certain  people 
got  the  ambition  to  own  a  tea  shop  in  Greenwich  Vil- 
lage, the  very  same  people  thought  it  the  aim  of  their 
lives  to  be  the  proprietors  of  book  shops  in  the  vicin- 
ity of  Washington  Square.  Still  more  ambitious  were 
they.  They  wanted  to  print  their  own  books.  The 
Boni  Brothers  (now  Boni  and  Liveright)  started  their 
Glebe  magazine  there,  and  published  pretty  little 
books  by  all  sorts  of  authors;  Kreymborg  here  printed 
his  booklets;  and  many  others,  whose  fame  was  too 
short  lived  to  be  recorded,  half  a  dozen  of  them.  One 
sold  out  to  the  other  and  finally  Egmont  Arens  pur- 
chased whatever  there  was  left  from  pretty  Renee 
LaCoste.   His  became  the  bookshop  of  the  neighborhood. 

Arens  is  a  born  publisher,  a  litterateur,  himself,  a 
connoisseur  of  good  books,  and  an  excellent  business 
man,  to  boot.  So  he  became  the  first  successful  busi- 
ness man  in  Greenwich  Village.  His  shop  is  crowded 
with  intellectuals  from  the  whole  town.  He  invites 
geniuses  as  well  as  buyers  of  books.  His  series  of 
plays — there  are  seven  of  them  published  to  date — are 
the  first  plays  of  men  who  are  making  their  way  in  the 
great  theatrical  world,  and  who  gave  life  for  a  time 
to  the  Little  Theatre  movement  in  New  York.  Arens 
is  a  good  business  man,  as  I  said  before,  and  so  he 


INBOOKSHOPS  53 


recently  purchased  a  prkiting  plant  and  is  printing  his 
own  books.  His  Whitman  book  is  the  best  on  the 
market,  and  his  next  publication  shows  his  daring 
spirit. 

To  publish  a  verbatim  translation  of  Arthur 
Schnitzler's  famous  "Reigen,"  is  surely  a  courageous 
undertaking  in  our  times  of  Comstockery,  Sumnerism 
and  superprudery.  These  ten  dialogues  caused  a  con- 
siderable stir  throughout  the  civilized  world.  They 
were  translated  into  every  language,  including  Japan- 
ese, but  excluding  English.  No  English  or  American 
publisher  cared  to  give  these  exquisite  silhouettes  of 
real  life  to  the  reading  public. 

Some  months  ago  a  young  writer  who  is  known  for 
his  imbroglios  with  the  vice  censor  (from  which  he 
invariably  emerged  as  victor)  gave  a  private  reading 
of  the  plays  before  an  invited  audience.  Arens  was 
there  and  at  once  decided  to  undertake  the  publication. 

"The  publisher  ought  to  be  a  book  seller  and  should 
spend  most  of  his  time  in  his  book  shop.  That  is  the 
only  way  to  feel  the  pulse  of  the  reading  public,"  is 
Mr.  Arens'  motto. 

It  isn't  a  bad  maxim  for  a  modern  American  pub- 
lisher. 

A  German  Bookseller 

High  upon  Lexington  Avenue,  near  Fifty-seventh 
street,  is  the  book  shop  of  Mr.  E.  Weyhe.  His  spe- 
cialties are  books  on  art,  rare  prints,  etchings  and 
books  on  laces. 

"I  am  a  German,"  said  Mr.  Weyhe.  "I  can't  do 
anything  about  it.  I  simply  have  to  make  the  best 
of  it  in  these  times  of  war.  I  always  have  been  a 
bookseller.  I  was  an  apprentice  to  a  bookseller  in 
Germany,  and  I  learned  the  trade  in  the  old  German 
way.  I  worked  from  six  o'clock  in  the  morning  until 
ten  o'clock  at  night  for  three  long  years.  I  loved  to 
travel  and  was  employed  in  shops  in  Germany,  Italy, 
and  finally  I  settled  in  London.  There  I  opened  a 
shop.  Unfortunately  for  me  the  war  broke  out.  I 
had  to  close  up  and  the  next  best  thing  to  do  was  to 


54  ADVENTURES 


come  over  here.  The  British  Government  most 
courteously  gave  me  permit  to  leave,  and  I  will  never 
forget  the  kind  words  of  the  policeman  who  took  me 
to  the  steamer:  'I  hope  you  will  soon  come  back  and 
not  stay  in  America'." 

Mr.  Weyhe  caters  to  moneyed  collectors  exclusive- 
ly. People  who  buy  books  on  laces  for  $250.00,  or  a 
history  of  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds'  work  for  $350.00, 
people  who  want  rare  things  and  to  whom  money  is 
no  object.  He  is  a  friend  of  the  artist  and  writer, 
who  are  welcome  in  his  shop,  to  whom  he  lends  books 
on  chance  acquaintance,  because  he  believes  in  human 
honesty  and  has  unbounded  faith  in  his  fellow-men. 

"People  trust  me.  Why  shouldn't  I  trust  them," 
was  his  simple  remark.  It  seems  quite  wonderful  to 
think  that  Mr.  Weyhe  came  to  America  four  years  ago 
as  a  refugee  and  without  funds,  and  owns  today  a 
choice  stock  of  the  rarest  books,  the  confidence  of 
his  clients  and  credit  wherever  he  desires  it. 

Mr.  Gerhardt's  Den 

Opposite  the  library  on  Forty-second  Street,  high 
up  in  a  medium  sized  sky-scraper,  is  Mr.  Gerhardt's 
den.  Christian  Gerhardt  is  a  specialist  in  out-of-the- 
way  books  by  out-of-the-way  authors.  He  issues 
catalogues  every  month,  and  these  catalogues  are  in- 
dexes of  curiosities  of  literature.  Pamphlets  by  well 
known  authors,  perhaps  their  first  literary  products, 
books  by  fanatics,  and  by  poets  whose  songs  were 
never  known  by  the  world.  Individualistic  magazines 
of  whose  existence  you  have  never  heard,  fill  long 
rows  of  his  book  shelves.  But  whenever  I  think  of 
Mr.  Gerhardt  I  remember  that  unhappy  singer  of  our 
East  Side,  of  Zoe  Anderson,  who  called  herself  the 
"Queen  of  Bohemia,"  who  founded  the  Ragged  Edge 
Club,  and  presided  for  years  at  its  unique  sessions  in 
the  "old  Maria."  Miss  Anderson  struggled  for  years 
with  printers,  paper  dealers,  and  news  companies  in 
order  to  give  us  her  little  magazine.  The  East  Side, 
a  fearless,  free-lance  sheet,  in  which  she  attacked 
everyone  and  everything.     The  champion  of  the  out- 


INBOOKSHOPS  55 


casts  and  sweatshop  workers  of  the  East  Side,  living 
among  them,  writing  about  them  with  greater  under- 
standing than  any  contemporary  writer,  poor  Zoe 
ended  her  own  life  as  cheerfully  as  ghe  had  lived 
after  telling  all  about  it  in  the  then  current  and  last 
issue  of  her  magazine.  Zoe  Anderson  had  been  a 
well  known  newspaper  woman  on  the  staffs  of  many 
metropolitan  papers,  including  the  New  York  Times. 

Gerhardt  was  her  lieutenant,  the  moving  spirit  of 
her  Ragged  Edge  Club,  master  of  ceremonies  of  the 
jolly  dinners  she  used  to  give,  and  master  of  cere- 
monies at  her  funeral,  where  they  carried  out  her  last 
wishes:  The  same  band  that  had  played  merry  dances 
for  her  while  alive,  plaj^ed  the  same  merry  dances 
during  the  burial  ceremonies.  "The  East  Side  is 
mournful  enough.  I  have  always  tried  to  make  them 
happy.  Let  them  be  merry  to  the  tune  of  gay  music 
while  they  are  burying  me,"  were  her  own  directions. 

Gerhardt  became  her  literary  executor  and  her  few 
books,  together  with  bound  copies  of  her  magazine 
always  occupy  a  place  of  honor  in  his  den. 


1918 


56  ADVENTURES 


III. 

FORTY-SECOND  Street  loses  its  brilliance  on 
Seventh  Avenue  and  shows  all  the  way  down  to 
the  West  Side  ferries  the  sad  degeneration  of  a 
New  York  street  that  was  once  a  fashionable  residence 
section.  Glaring  electric  signs  from  Fifth  to  Seventh 
Avenues.  High  life  after  dusk.  Eighteen  theaters. 
Cabarets  galore.  The  amusement  center  of  the  metrop- 
olis around  Broadway.  The  seat  of  learning  in  one 
whole  block  on  Fifth  Avenue.  The  moment  you  cross 
Seventh  Avenue,  cheap  rooming  houses,  tenement 
dwellings,  sweat  shops.  Wealth  and  poverty  rub  el- 
bows. Puritanical  decency  on  the  borders  of  the  city's 
mire.  Lunch  rooms,  garages,  plumber  shops,  dirty 
Jewish  and  Italian  groceries,  loan  brokers'  offices, 
everywhere  signs  "Rooms  to  Let,"  gaudily  dressed 
women  emerge  from  dark  house  entrances  on  whose 
stoops  laborers  read  their  evening  papers.  Children 
everywhere,  ragged,  uncared  for  children. 

In  the  midst  of  this  typically  American  panorama, 
pinched  in  between  a  repair  shop  and  a  restaurant,  is 
Mr.  Lawson's  book  store.  He  sells  books,  too,  but  I 
would  rather  call  his  place  of  business  an  "intellectual 
exchange." 

"How  can  you  sell  books  in  this  neighborhood?"  I 
asked  of  Mr.  Lawson  on  my  first  visit  to  his  shop.  I 
knew  him  a  dozen  of  years  ago  in  Chicago.  He's  a 
book  man  of  the  old  school.  He  knows  books,  is  well 
read,  well  known  among  the  members  of  his  guild. 
Americana  had  been  his  specialty  and  many  a  scarce 
and  rare  item  had  he  discovered  in  days  gone  by. 

"What  a  strange  place  you  have  selected  here  in 
New  York." 

"Stick  around  for  a  couple  of  hours  and  you  will  see 
yourself  that  book  stores  of  my  brand  are  actually 
needed  in  this  sort  of  neighborhood  in  New  York," 
was  his  oflF-hand  answer,  while  he  continued  counting 
green  and  yellow  tickets,  assorting  them  by  their 
colors. 

"What  are  they?"  I  asked. 


INBOOKSHOPS  57 


"Coupons,"  was  the  answer.  "All  these  people  in 
my  neighborhood  insist  on  getting  coupons  with  all 
their  purchases.  So-called  profit-sharing  coupons. 
They  get  them  with  their  cigars,  with  their  soap,  with 
their  butter,  with  most  of  their  victuals.'  Each  of 
these  coupons  represents  a  certain  cash  value.  Here 
in  this  catalogue,"  and  he  showed  me  a  voluminous 
book  with  many  pictures,  "you  can  see  what  they  can 
exchange  for  their  coupons  if  they  choose  to  save 
enough  of  them.  Here  lies  the  point.  They  never 
save  enough  of  these  coupons.  Most  of  my  customers 
live  from  hand  to  mouth,  often  they  are  in  actual  need 
of  ten  or  fifteen  cents.  I  buy  their  coupons.  At  other 
times,  again  they  come  down  here  to  buy  coupons  in 
order  to  complete  the  needed  number  of  the  slips  and 
to  exchange  them  for  some  household  article,  but 
mostly  for  'gifts.'  You  would  be  surprised  how  they 
like  cheap  bric-a-brac,  phony  jewelry  and  most  of  all, 
cut-glass — imitation  cut-glass,  of  course.  Most  of  my 
business  is  done  after  6  o'clock  in  the  evening. 

"See  the  music  rolls  over  there?  A  player-piano 
concern  established  some  time  ago  a  branch  in  this 
section  and  got  rid  of  hundreds  of  instruments.  And 
whenever  the  people  need  money  they  bring  me  their 
music  rolls.  I  pay  a  few  cents  for  them.  But  that's 
just  what  they  need.  They  sell  them  on  Thursday 
and  Friday.  On  Saturday,  after  they  receive  their 
pay  checks,  they  buy  new  ones.  It  is  a  part  of  their 
life's    routine." 

An  old  woman  came  in  with  a  bunch  of  magazines, 
Mr.  Lawson  bought  them  for  a  few  cents. 

"She  keeps  a  rooming  house,"  he  explained.  "Her 
roomers  are  cheap  comedians,  who  never  stay  longer 
than  a  couple  of  days  or  so,  and  always  leave  maga- 
zines when  they  move.  She  sells  them.  She  also 
sends  her  roomers  down  to  me  to  buy  magazines  if 
they  get  lonely  in  the  evening  and  inquire  for  some- 
thing to  read. 

"You  see  that  man?"  and  he  pointed  to  an  old  fel- 
low who  was  examining  carefully  a  big  heap  of  maga- 
zines.    "He's  the  news  dealer  from  the  corner.     He 


58  ADVENTURES 


runs  in  several  times  a  day  and  buys  lots  of  maga- 
zines. The  American  News  Companv  grants  him  the 
return  privilege  on  certain  magazines  for  30  days  and 
others  for  60  days.  He  buys  any  standard  magazine 
of  the  current  week  here  for  a  nickel,  some  even 
cheaper,  and  then  he  returns  them  to  the  news  com- 
pany at  full  value.  For  instance,  he  buys  a  20-cent 
magazine  for  a  nickel  and  the  American  News  Com- 
pany credits  him  with  15  cents  upon  its  return. 

"There  is  nothing  on  earth  that  you  can  not  sell  in 
this  neighborhood,  and  on  the  other  hand,  you  would 
be  constantly  surprised  what  people  will  offer  you  for 
sale." 

The  store  was  crowded.  Boys  wanted  detective 
stories,  women  dream  books,  foreigners  dictionaries, 
somebody  was  trying  records  on  an  old  phonograph  in 
the  back  of  the  store.  A  woman  who  still  showed 
traces  of  great  beauty  wanted  to  get  rid  of  hundreds 
of  photographs  of  herself,  showing  her  in  exotic  stage 
costume. 

"But  how  about  these  oil  paintings?"  There  were 
some  magnificent  pictures  in  one  corner  and  really 
good  books  right  next  to  trashy  novels.  "That's  the 
other  side  of  my  book  business,"  answered  Lawson. 
"Dealers  come  in  from  all  parts  of  the  country  and  I 
have  the  whole  day  to  myself  to  attend  auctions,  to 
visit  collectors.  A  good  many  gems  have  drifted  in 
here.  Doesn't  it  look  like  a  junk  shop?  And  I  dare 
to  say  that  very  few  dealers  in  New  York  have  such 
valuable  books,  autographs,  prints,  paintings  and  etch- 
ings as  I  have  at  times  right  here  among  all  this 
junk." 

A  procession  of  strange  people  continued  to  pour  in. 
Everybody  bought  something,  sold  or  exchanged 
something,  half  a  dozen  languages  were  talked  simul- 
taneously and  the  cash  register  rang  merrily  through 
the  noise  and  constant  chatter. 

"There  must  be  lots  of  money  in  this  novel  game 
of  yours?"  I  asked  of  Lawson.  "Of  course  there  is," 
he  answered  cheerfully.  "The  individual  purchases 
are  small,  but  judge  for  yourself  how  many  people  are 


INBOOKSHOPS  59 


coming  in  and  then  don't  forget  that  every  one  of 
them  is  a  steady  customer,  coming  down  here  almost 
every  other  day.  Buying  or  selling,  but  I  am  always 
the  winner.  And  I  dare  say  that  these  people  would 
miss  me.  I  provide  for  them  amusement,  pleasure, 
and  even  education,  and  do  they  not  come  to  me  in 
their  need?" 

Casement's  Book  Emporium 

Book  stores,  like  mushrooms,  never  grow  solitary. 
Only  a  few  doors  south  is  another  book  store.  Noth- 
ing but  books  and  magazines.  Mr.  Casement  is  the 
proprietor.  Somebody  told  me  once  that  Mr.  Case- 
ment is  a  second  cousin  of  Sir  Roger  Casement.  But 
Mr.  Casement  denied  any  relationship  with  the  great 
Irish  patriot.  He  could  not  deny,  however,  his  Irish 
origin.  "I  sell  magazines  mostly  to  my  neighbors 
here,  detective  stories  to  the  boys  and  Meade's  books 
to  the  girls.  But  the  dealers  from  all  over  town  come 
here  and  pick  out  whatever  they  want." 

All  his  books  are  alphabetically  arranged  and  I 
don't  wonder  that  many  a  scarce  book  can  be  found 
amongst  his  stock.  Mr.  Casement  is  a  solitary  figure 
among  the  book  dealers  of  New  York.  Very  silent, 
always  kindly,  smiling,  obliging  and  unassuming. 
Often  in  the  twilgiht,  when  he  drinks  his  cup  of  coffee, 
and  eats  his  herring  with  rye  bread,  I  love  to  drop  in 
and  watch  his  self-content  and  real  satisfaction  with 
his  life  and  with  his  lot.  He  is  the  only  happy  man 
among  all  the  book  dealers  in  New  York — from  hope 
and  fear  set  free — content  among  his  books. 

The  Madison  Book  Store 

The  only  uptown  book  shop  that  keeps  open  in  the 
evening.  The  visitors  here  are  quite  different  from 
those  on  42d  street.  But  I  guess  they  are  as  lonesome 
and  often  as  helpless  as  the  people  who  come  to  Mr. 
Lawson's  shop.  There  are  the  strangers  from  the  big 
hostelries  on  Fifth  avenue,  the  girls  from  the  Studio 
Club,  and  a  good  many  physicians  from  the  nearby 
clinical   buidlings.     Mr.   Alexander   A.    Salop    is    the 


60  ADVENTURES 


master  of  the  mansion.  A  young  man,  studious  look- 
ing, perhaps  because  he  wears  eye  glasses.  A  shrewd 
business  man  but  books  are  not  only  merchandise  to 
him.  He  reads  much  in  several  languages,  has  his 
likes  and  dislikes  in  literature  and  keeps  always  a 
great  variety  of  modern  German  and  French  books. 
A  little  room  in  the  back  of  his  shop  is  consecrated 
to  the  bookworms.  A  few  comfortable  chairs,  reading 
lamps,  library  tables,  it  looks  very  homey  and  too  in- 
viting to  simply  buy  and  go.  Peter  Stammer,  who 
calls  himself  "The  Original  New  York  Book  Hunter" 
and  who  knows  the  book  if  it  was  ever  printed  any- 
where and  at  any  time  in  this  world,  comes  here  often 
in  the  evening  to  pick  up  books,  but  mostly  to  chat, 
to  "swap"  experiences. 

Mr.  Stammer  ought  to  write  his  memoirs  for  the 
benefit  of  contemporary  literature.  Here  are  a  few 
interesting  bits  gleaned  from  him  several  days  ago: 

"Did  you  ever  know,"  he  asked,  "that  Henry  James 
had  a  sister?  She  must  have  been  a  literary  woman 
of  great  ability.  About  40  years  ago  I  was  a  type- 
setter in  an  English  town.  I  remember  the  most 
curious  job  I  ever  had  to  do  was  a  book  by  Miss 
James.  It  was  a  sort  of  autobiography  most  extraord- 
inary. A  big  book  of  several  hundred  pages,  very  in- 
timate and  outspoken.  Only  three  copies  were  to  be 
printed.  The  type  was  destroyed  and  even  the  proof 
pages  had  to  be  returned.  I  wonder  what  ever  hap- 
pened to  that  book.  I  wish  I  could  have  made  a  copy 
of  its  contents.  I  set  up  the  first  edition  of  Oscar 
Wilde's  'Ballad  of  Reading  Gaol.'  That  was  in  Bos- 
ton while  I  worked  for  Benjamin  Tucker. 

"You  would  naturally  think  that  a  book  printed  in 
many  millions  of  copies  could  never  become  scarce. 
I  thought  so,  too,  until  I  ran  across  a  poem  by  Bret 
Harte,  his  Excelsior.  I  didn's  find  the  poem  among 
his  collected  works.  Bret  Harte  collectors  didn't 
seem  to  know  of  its  existence.  I  started  inquiries  to 
investigate  and  I  found  that  this  poem  had  been  writ- 
ten as  an  advertisement  for  a  well  known  soap,  had 
been  printed  in  millions  of  copies,  distributed  free  of 


INBOOKSHOPS  61 


charge  all  over  America.  Curious  enough,  my  copy 
was  the  only  existing  one  outside  one  in  the  files  of 
the  soap  concern." 

Mr.  Stammer  knows  books  and  people  so  well,  has 
met  so  many  writers,  he  really  ought  to  retire  from 
business  for  a  year  and  write  his  reminiscences. 


1918 


62  ADVENTURES 


IV. 

BOOK  dealers  and  dressmakers  are  very  much 
alike.  Both  supply  us  with  things  most  necessary 
in  daily  life,  and  with  its  useless  luxuries.  If  you 
are  rich  you  walk  into  an  exclusive  dressmaking  estab- 
lishment on  Fifth  Avenue.  You  tell  the  dressmaker:  "I 
want  to  look  slender,  I  like  such  and  such  a  color,  I 
want  long  skirts  or  short  skirts."  You  ask  for  an  eve- 
ning gown  or  for  a  street  dress  or  for  an  afternoon 
gown.  And  if  you  are  rich  and  wish  to  buy  books 
you'll  go  next  door  to  the  exclusive  book  shop,  you 
will  tell  the  salesman:  "I  want  a  novel  or  a  biography, 
something  serious  or  something  humorous;  I  don't 
want  it  too  free.  The  salesman  will  size  you  up  and 
will  bring  forth  the  books  which  you  will  wish  to  take 
with  you.  At  your  next  visit,  dressmaker  as  well  as 
bookdealer  will  have  your  "size"  and  your  "number" 
and  you  will  not  have  to  repeat  your  special  desires. 

If  you  are  only  a  well-to-do  man  or  woman  with  a 
regular  salary  or  income,  you  have  your  charge  ac- 
counts in  department  stores  and  medium  class  shops, 
in  book  stores  on  Booksellers'  Row,  as  Fourth  Avenue 
between  Eleventh  and  Fourteenth  Street  was  so  justly 
christened,  or  perhaps  in  one  of  the  many  book  shops 
on  Fifty-ninth  Street.  The  merchants  here  will  not 
pay  so  very  much  attention  to  your  wishes  and  to 
your  tastes,  but  try  to  impress  you  with  the  sanctity 
of  the  merciless  goddess  "Vogue."  The  salesman 
doesn't  care  that  you  detest  ruffles  and  fringes.  They 
are  in  season  and  therefore  you  ought  to  wear  them 
or  you  are  a  back  number  and  he  treats  you  with  con- 
tempt. The  department  store  book  salesman  will  tell 
you  that  Robert  Chambers'  last  novel  is  "The  Best 
Seller"  and  if  you  tell  him  that  Chambers  doesn't  write 
to  your  taste,  he  will  simply  pity  you,  and  tell  you  that 
"Everybody"  is  reading  it,  and  that  is  final. 

But  if  you  are  poor  or  your  circumstances  permit 
you  to  expend  only  a  certain  amount  of  money  for 
your  clothes  and  for  your  books  and  you  despise  the 
department   store  atmosphere   with   its   alluring  bar- 


INBOOKSHOPS  63 


gains  that  persecute  you  ever  after  you  were  weak 
enough  to  buy  them,  like  spooks  of  murdered  souls, 
then  adventures  galore  are  in  store  for  you,  especially 
if  you  live  in  New  York.  Because  one  day  surely  you 
will  run  across  "that  marvelous  dressmaker"  who 
charges  only  a  couple  of  dollars  a  day,  follows  your 
ideas,  creates  dreams  of  garments,  and  makes  dressing 
a  pleasure  for  you. 

And  in  the  strangest  parts  of  the  city,  like  a  gera- 
nium pot  on  the  sill  of  a  tenement  house,  you  encoun- 
ter once  in  a  while  a  real  book  store  in  New  York. 
Is  not  the  discovery  an  event  in  our  unromantic  lives? 
Looking  over  the  dust-covered  treasures  is  an  explora- 
tion into  strange  lands,  and  usually  a  talk  with  the 
proprietor  himself  charms  us  like  the  fairy  tale  of 
long  forgotten  childhood. 

Second  Avenue,  around  First  Street,  is  the  promen- 
ade of  that  part  of  the  Bowery  which  has  not  yet 
been  turned  into  factories  and  sweat  shops.  Here  are 
delicatessen  stores,  second-hand  furniture  dealers, 
grocery  shops,  ice  cream  parlors,  drug  stores,  moving 
picture  theatres,  with  crudely  painted  advertising 
boards  depicting  scenes  from  blood-and-thunder  dra- 
mas. Then  there  is  Kettel's  Theatre,  where  they  play 
Shakespeare  in  Yiddish.  Thousands  of  men  and 
women  people  the  sidewalks  and  street.  Roumanian, 
Hungarian,  German  and  Polish  with  a  Jewish  accent 
are  spoken  here,  and  Yiddish,  of  course,  the  guttural 
sounds  of  which  give  the  ear  the  same  sensation  as 
the  eye  receives  from  the  window  display  of  the  for- 
eign looking  pickles,  fancily  prepared  onions,  and 
enormous  strangely-shaped  sausages  of  the  stores. 
The  women  are  without  headgear,  in  underskirts,  with 
blankets  or  shawls  around  their  shoulders,  their  shoes 
unbuttoned;  they  have  run  out  to  buy  something. 
Everybody  on  this  street  seems  to  buy  or  sell,  talking 
loudly,  bargaining  with  a  passion  inherited  through 
generations.  On  the  corner  of  Second  Avenue  and 
First  Street  is  the  Municipal  Court,  with  its  crowds 
of  lawyers,  of  fighting,  screaming  and  excited  men 
and  women  on  the  doorsteps. 


64  ADVENTURES 


Mr.  Kirschenbaum's  Shop 

Who  in  this  beehive  has  time  or  desire  to  view  the 
book  stalls  in  front  of  Mr.  Kirschenbaum's  book 
store?  Why  did  he  select  this  extraordinary  location 
for  his  shop?  A  tall,  heavy-set,  broad-shouldered  Pole, 
with  blonde  whiskers,  blue  eyes,  and  an  expression  of 
kindness  on  his  face  that  doesn't  seem  to  correspond 
with  the  muscles  of  his  arms  of  which  no  prize  fighter 
need  be  ashamed.  And  if  you  walk  into  his  shop 
you'll  find  almost  any  time  between  eight  a.  m.  and 
midnight,  men  and  women  there  like  yourself,  from 
all  parts  of  the  city,  buying  all  sorts  of  books,  as 
recently  on  a  Saturday  afternoon  when  a  young  girl 
asked  for  a  copy  of  Thomas  a  Kempis  and  an  old  man 
for  a  copy  of  Oscar  Wilde's  fairy  tales. 

He  has  a  little  bit  of  everything  in  his  shop,  but 
you  have  to  take  the  trouble  of  looking  through  it 
in  order  to  discover  the  "gems"  you  are  looking  for. 
Here  is  Mr.  Kirschenbaum's  story  in  a  few  words: 

"I  served  twelve  years  in  a  Polish  regiment  of  the 
Austrian  army  as  a  non-commissioned  officer.  Later 
on  I  was  an  agent  of  officers  and  of  the  nobility  in 
Galicia.  There  was  nothing  that  I  wouldn't  buy  of 
them  or  that  I  wouldn't  sell  to  them.  If  they  needed 
money  I  got  it  for  them.  One  day  I  decided  to  emi- 
grate to  this  country. 

When  I  arrived  here,  I  got  a  push  cart,  went 
through  the  streets  of  New  York,  bought  up  every- 
thing people  had  no  use  for,  and  then  I  sold  it  in  the 
Bowery  from  my  cart.  They  called  me  the  "Siegel 
Cooper  of  the  East  Side."  Soon  I  specialized  in  books. 
I  didn't  know  books  and  their  value  and  I  sold  them 
as  I  am  selling  them  today,  as  merchandise.  I  buy 
them  for  a  certain  price  and  I  sell  them  at  a  certain 
profit,  and  I  don't  care  how  much  they  are  really 
worth.  I  haven't  got  time  to  look  real  values  up. 
I'm  too  busy  selling  in  quantities.  One  of  my  sons 
knows  books.  He  opened  a  shop  on  Fourth  Avenue, 
but  I'm  satisfied  to  turn  over  my  stock  as  quickly  as 
I  can.     I  always  had  known  big  people  in  the  old 


INBOOKSHOPS  65 


country,  and  some  of  them  I  met  here  in  influential 
positions.  I  had  a  hard  time  during  my  first  years  in 
America,  and  they  offered  me  great  positions  in  some 
branches  of  business  that  they  knew  I  was  an  expert 
in,  but  the  first  demand  they  made  was  to  shear  off 
my  beard:  I  knew  what  that  meant.  I  looked  too 
Jewish  to  them.  My  beard  was  never  touched  by  a 
razor  and  never  will  be  as  long  as  I  live,  and  my  in- 
sisting upon  the  preservation  of  the  exterior  of  an 
orthodox  Jew  made  me  impossible  in  any  leading 
position  of  a  business  organization,  so  you  see  I  had 
to  start  an  independent  business.  That's  how  I  hap- 
pen to  be  here." 

Mr.  Kirschenbaum's  shelves  and  tables  contain 
something  of  everything  in  all  languages  about  all 
subjects.  To  spend  a  couple  of  hours  in  his  shop  will 
prove  that  there  is  nothing  new  and  original  in  this 
world  that  has  not  been  written  about  by  somebody 
years  and  years  ago. 

A   Specialist   in   Excitement 

If  you  think  that  the  sensational  paper  novel,  the 
mystery  story  in  installments  printed  on  newspaper, 
the  dearly  beloved  Nick  Carter  stories,  are  things  of 
the  past  because  you  don't  see  them  in  the  regulation 
book  stores  where  "intellectuals"  meet,  you  are  mis- 
taken. They  are  as  widely  read  as  ever,  and  Mr.  Joe 
W.  Knoke  specializes  in  these  delights  of  certain  old 
ladies,  of  boys  and  young  girls.  His  little  store  on 
Third  Avenue  between  Ninth  and  Tenth  Streets  is 
filled  up  with  the  most  gruesome  experiences  in  crime 
and  adventure. 

"I  have  been  here  for  twelve  years,"  he  said  re- 
cently, one  could  hardly  hear  his  words,  so  great  was 
the  noise  of  the  elevated  thundering  on  its  structure 
and  the  heavy  delivery  wagons  rumbling  over  the  old- 
fashioned  cobblestones. 

"I  know  my  customers  well.  Some  arer  reading 
detective  stories  exclusively;  they  don't  want  anything 
but  detective  stories.  The  younger  generation  pre- 
fers old  magazines  with  short  stories  to  paper  novels. 


66  ADVENTURES 


I  buy  them  by  the  pound  from  rag  dealers,  from  the 
Salvation  Army  and  everywhere  I  can  get  them. 
People  pay  as  much  as  five  cents  for  such  back  num- 
bers. Once  upon  a  time  lots  of  Irish  people  used  to 
live  in  this  neighborhood  and  many  Irish  ladies  still 
come  to  my  shop  to  buy  the  works  of  Charles  Garvice 
and  of  Bertha  M.  Clay.  These  are  clean,  good  love 
stories.  After  they  are  through  they  bring  them  back 
and  I  allow  them  a  few  pennies  on  their  next  pur- 
chase, but  in  a  few  months  they  ask  for  the  same 
books  again,  and  some  of  my  customers  read  every 
year  the  same  books  over  and  over. 

"Then  there  are  the  shop  girls  from  near-by  de- 
partment stores.  They  buy  Street  and  Smith  paper 
novels.  The  thicker  the  book  the  quicker  they  take 
it.  They  tell  each  other  about  the  most  exciting  of 
these  love  stories,  and  they,  too,  read  the  same  books 
constantly.  Over  there,"  and  he  pointed  to  a  whole 
shelf  full  of  mysterious  looking  pamphlets  and  books, 
"are  my  dream  books,  books  on  palmistry  and  on  for- 
tune telling.  Old  ladies  buy  them.  There  are  just  as 
many  dream  books  as  cook  books,  and  each  of  these 
ladies  sticks  to  the  same  brand  for  almost  a  life-time. 
Often  they  bring  in  old  torn,  finger-marked  copies  in 
which  the  printing  can  hardly  be  distinguished,  and 
they  wish  to  get  another  copy  of  the  very  same  book. 
Perhaps  it  hasn't  been  printed  for  the  last  thirty  or 
forty  years,  and  you  should  see  their  disappointment 
if  I  tell  them  so,  and  how  suspiciously  they  eye  other 
dream  books  before  they  decide  to  buy  one.  Young 
girls  also  often  are  purchasers  of  dream  books  and 
books  on  palmistry.  They  use  them  for  entertainment 
at  parties  and  take  them  along  on  picnics.  One  old 
gentleman  comes  along  every  once  in  a  while  early  in 
the  morning,  buys  a  magazine  for  a  nickel  and  then 
spends  a  considerable  length  of  time  before  my  dream 
book  shelf.  I  always  wonder, if  he  is  looking  up  his 
last  night's  dream.  Once  I  suggested  to  him  to  buy  a 
copy,  but  he  got  indignant  "because  he  didn't  believe 
in  such  superstititous  humbug." 


INBOOKSHOPS  67 


The  Man  Who  Knows  His  Books 

A  spotlessly  clean  little  store  on  Thirty-eighth 
Street  near  Sixth  Avenue,  book  shelves  all  around  the 
walls,  friendly  pictures  right  beneath  the  ceiling.  In 
the  middle  of  the  room  a  little  desk,  and  in  a  chair 
before  it  Mr.  Corbett,  who  prides  himself  on  having 
read  every  book  that  he  ever  sold.  Jack  London  used 
to  spend  hours  here  whenever  he  was  in  New  York, 
and  Edwin  Markham  received  a  good  deal  of  inspira- 
tion from  Mr.  Corbett's  suggestions.  Literary  hack 
writers  are  his  daily  visitors;  to  call  them  customers 
would  be  too  optimistic.  He  dreams  of  magazine 
articles,  he  invents  titles  for  them  and  he  sells  you  for 
a  few  pennies  all  the  material  to  write  them  if  you 
happen  to  be  a  journalist  on  the  lookout  for  sug- 
gestions. 

He  has  his  own  peculiar  ideas  of  what  people  should 
read  and  what  they  shouldn't  read,  and  it  is  not  an 
unusual  occurrence  that,  for  instance,  a  young  girl 
should  enter  his  shop  and  ask  for  a  certain  book,  and 
he  would  answer:  "Yes,  I  have  it,  but  you  shouldn't 
read  it,  and  I  won't  sell  it  to  you."  And  then  he  will 
tell  her  about  some  other  book,  and  picture  it  in  such 
desirable  colors  that  she  will  change  her  mind  and 
buy  it  instead. 

"You  know,"  he  told  me  once,  "the  bookseller  has 
a  very  important  mission  in  life.  The  writer  writes 
his  books,  but  he  doesn't  know  into  whose  hands  they 
will  fall,  the  publisher  sells  them  as  merchandise  to 
dealers  all  over  the  country,  but  we  little  shop-keepers 
come  in  contact  with  the  real  readers.  It's  up  to  us 
to  place  something  in  their  hands  that  might  be  de- 
cisive for  their  future  career,  that  might  inspire  them 
to  great  and  noble  thoughts,  and  that  might  make 
criminals  out  of  them.  A  few  pennies  that  we  might 
gain  might  mean  the  perdition  of  lives  and  souls. 

The  Farmer-Bookseller 

Mr.  D.  L.  Haberson  is  now  on  Saturdays  only  in 
his  little  book  store  that  seems  so  lonesome  and  sol- 
itary on  Twenty-third  Street  near  Eighth  Avenue  in 


68  ADVENTURES 


the  midst  of  cheap  rooming  houses  and  the  noise  of 
the  subway  excavations  and  constructions  that  are 
going  on  dav  and  night.  After  years  of  toil  he  has 
arrived  at  the  goal  of  his  ambition.  He  has  bought 
a  farm  on  Long  Island.  One  of  those  small  farms 
on  which  one  has  to  be  an  artist  in  order  to  make 
both  ends  meet.  But  he  was  in  the  book  business  for 
such  a  long  time  that  almost  nothing  seems  impossible 
to  him,  and  he  used  to  display  many  curious  books 
in  his  shop.  Especially  out-of-the-way  magazines, 
edited  by  out-of-the-way  people,  were  his  hobby.  A 
small  man,  pale  and  slender,  with  the  eyes  of  a  philos- 
opher, what  strange  desire  must  have  taken  posses- 
sion of  him  to  wish  to  till  the  soil?  He  installed  an 
assistant  in  his  shop,  surely  not  a  lucrative  job,  but 
this  man  told  me:  "I  like  it  here.  I  can  read  all  day 
and  can  save  the  money  that  I  used  to  spend  for 
books."  That's  the  stuff*  most  of  those  little  book 
dealers  are  made  of.  They  don't  aspire  to  commer- 
cial success.  If  they  make  a  living  and  can  read,  can 
read  constantly,  that's  their  reward  in  life. 

A  Night  Bird 

On  Columbus  Avenue,  between  Sixty-seventh  and 
Sixty-eighth  Streets,  near  Healey's  Cabaret,  a  window 
is  lighted  no  matter  at  what  time  in  the  night  you 
may  pass  by.  If  you  look  into  the  narrow  shop  you 
will  see  a  man  sitting  in  a  very  small  space,  surround- 
ed by  heaps  of  books,  smoking  a  long  cigar,  reading. 
His  store  remains  closed  in  the  day  time  and  I  don't 
imagine  that  the  people  who  spend  their  nights  in  Mr. 
Healey's  Cabaret  buy  books  before  they  go  home,  or 
to  some  other  place,  but  he  doesn't  seem  to  mind  and 
is  perfectly  happy  with  his  books,  which  grow  all 
around  him  and  make  the  space  in  which  he  can 
move  freely  smaller  from  day  to  day.  He  sits  there 
all  night  and  reads  his  books  and  is  delighted  to  dis- 
cover some  long-forgotten  writer,  to  point  out  his 
charms  to  you,  and  doesn't  even  ask  you  to  buy. 

And  there  is  Mr.  Lawson,  somewhere  far  west  on 
Forty-second   Street,  who  travels  about  the   country 


IN    BOOK    SHOPS  69 


picking  up  old  books  in  farm  houses,  and  Mr. 
Schwartz,  who  used  to  be  a  waiter,  and  who  started 
a  book  shop  near  Astor  Place.  He  wanted  to  cater 
to  the  discriminating  readers  of  the  spices  of  life,  but 
Mr.  Sumner  interfered  with  his  intentions  and  twice 
he  made  the  unpleasant  acquaintance  of  the  Society 
for  the  Suppression  of  Vice.  He  had  to  pay  a  fine 
and  do  something  more  painful  than  that,  and  now 
if  a  prospective  customer  asks  for  one  of  the  pro- 
scribed books,  he  shudders  piously,  brings  out  an  old 
edition  of  Shakespeare  and  recommends  the  English 
bard  as  a  suitable  substitute  for  some  French  writer. 

Jim  Gillin,  who  had  threatened  for  the  past  eight 
years  to  sell  out  his  book  shop  on  the  corner  of 
Twenty-eighth  Street  and  Lexington  Avenue,  has 
done  it  finally,  and  moved  out  to  his  place  somewhere 
in  Jersey  in  order  to  breed  rabbits,  the  study  and  the 
dream  of  his  life.  He  had  delved  in  books  for  so 
many  years  that  nobody  would  have  supposed  he 
would  ever  change  his  profession. 

Then  there  is  old  man  Johnson,  who  prints  cata- 
logues every  once  in  a  while  and  sends  them  out 
broadcast  from  his  basement  store  on  Twenty-eighth 
Street  near  Broadway,  and  who  is  constantly  and 
mysteriously  busy  at  his  desk,  day  and  night,  writing 
in  a  big  folio.  Perhaps  he  is  writing  the  adventures 
and  tribulations  of  a  New  York  book  dealer. 

Mr.   Stammer,    Their   Great   Patron 

Do  you  ask  "How  do  all  these  people  manage  to 
earn  a  livelihood?"  Mr.  Stammer,  the  great  book 
dealer  from  Fourth  Avenue,  whose  specialty  is  hunt- 
ing up  every  book  that  anybody  in  the  United  States 
might  desire,  no  matter  when  and  where  printed,  and 
who  knows  the  most  obscure  book  dealer  in  the  most 
obscure  part  of  New  York,  answered  this  question: 
"Because  two-thirds  of  the  book  dealers  in  New  York 
are  selling  exclusively  almost  to  the  remaining  third. 
The  big  book  dealers  very  rarely  buy  books  from 
private  sources.  These  little  book  shops  are  our  van- 
guards, that  collect  the  honey  for  us  and  we  come 


70  ADVENTURES 


and  take  whatever  we  can  use,  or  they  bring  it  to  us, 
and  we  are  glad  to  have  them  come  regularly."  Mr. 
Stammer  makes  his  round  to  these  small  book  dealers 
almost  constantly  every  day.  He  is  their  educator  and 
patron.  He  tells  them  what  books  are  worth  money, 
and  he  pays  a  good  price  whenever  he  can  use  them. 
He  is  a  welcome  figure  on  rent  day,  and  most  of  the 
treasures  of  these  cobwebbed  corners  wander  to  the 
comfortable  shelves  of  his  palace  on  Fourth  Avenue. 


1918 


INBOOKSHOPS  71 


Dealers  in  Literary  Property 

LETTERS  of  celebrated  men  and  women,  dead  and 
alive,  can  today  be  purchased  in  the  open  mar- 
ket. The  more  private  they  are  and  the  more 
they  incorporate  of  the  writer's  soul,  the  higher  the 
price. 

There  is  no  atmosphere  of  romance  in  these  trans- 
actions. The  autograph  dealers  sell  because  they  wish 
to  make  money.  The  purchasers  buy  because  they 
desire  to  possess  something  unique  and  because  they 
know  that  the  letters  and  autographs  of  celebrities  are 
an  excellent  investment.  Let  us  put  aside  untimely 
sentiment  and  assume  that  it  is  perfectly  proper  to  sell 
at  auction  Shelley's  love  letters,  or  that  a  letter  of 
Poe's  grocer  demanding  in  rude  terms  immediate  pay- 
ment of  two  dollars  and  fifty  cents  for  food  sup- 
plied, is  a  fitting  library  ornament  if  expensively 
framed  together  with  the  poet's  portrait,  and  let  us 
visit  a  few  of  the  important  dealers  in  such  literary 
property  in  New  York. 

Mr.  Benjamin's  office  is  situated  on  the  third  floor 
of  the  Brunswick  building  facing  Madison  Square. 
This  building  occupies  the  site  of  the  old  Brunswick 
Hotel,  once  famous  as  New  York's  resting  place  for 
the  literati  who  visited  the  United  States. 

The  walls  of  this  place  of  business  are  lined  with 
enormous  safes,  a  solitary  typewriter  clicks  solemnly; 
the  dignity  of  a  broker's  office  prevails,  such  dignity 
as  obtains  where  deeds  are  executed  involving  the 
transfer  of  millions. 

Behind  an  enormous  table  Mr.  Benjamin  is  seated 
Nothing  here  reminds  one  of  an  antiquarian's  cabinet 
or  of  a  collector's  museum.  It  is  the  working  table  of 
a  bank  president,  whose  chief  motto  is  "efficiency." 

"No,  there  is  mighty  little  romance  in  this  busi- 
ness," Mr.  Benjamin  began,  and  there  seemed  no  rea- 
son to  doubt  his  statement. 

"I  purchase  autographs,  manuscripts,  signed  por- 
traits and  all  kinds  of  literary  property  in  order  to  sell 


72  ADVENTURES 


again.  There  is  an  art  in  buying  and  a  greater  art 
in  selling;  it  requires  knowledge  and  a  certain  instinct 
or  ability  to  associate  events  and  people  so  that  the 
value  of  the  materials  increases  while  in  my  posses- 
sion. 

"I  deal  exclusively  in  gilt-edged  autographs  of  those 
men  who  have  made  history,  literature  and  music. 
Our  great  statesmen  are  my  specialty. 

"No  museum  or  library  in  the  world  has  at  pres- 
ent more  authentic  original  material  relating  to  our 
War  of  Independence  and  the  Civil  War  than  you  can 
see  in  these  safes  of  mine. 

"Framed  portraits  with  short  letters  by  men  of  note 
are  the  side  lines  of  book  and  art  dealers.  You  can- 
not find  them  here. 

"I  am  the  only  exclusive  dealer  in  autographs  in  the 
United  States.  I  have  been  thirty  years  at  the  game 
and  I  have  made  a  quarter  of  a  million  dollars.  Oh! 
Yes!  I  have  about  twice  that  amount  invested  in 
autographs." 

"How  does  one  become  a  dealer  in  literary  prop- 
erty? How  does  one  buy  and  sell?"  were  my  next 
questions. 

"I  can  tell  you  how  I  did  it,  but  as  for  the  others — 
I  would  refuse  to  guarantee  results — unlike  the  de- 
tective correspondence  schools. 

"I  did  not  want  to  be  a  dealer  in  autographs  as  a 
young  man,  but  about  forty  odd  years  ago  I  had 
dreams  that  some  day  my  own  autographs  would  be 
valuable,  or  that  at  least  I  should  be  able  to  sell  some 
of  them  to  publishers  and  editors.  My  father,  Park 
Benjamin,  had  been  a  literary  man  and  a  poet  of  note. 
He  successfully  edited  big  daily  papers  in  New  York. 
I  g^raduated  from  Union  College,  served  my  appren- 
ticeship on  country  magazines  and  was  at  the  age  of 
nineteen,  editor  of  the  Schenectady  Daily  Union. 

"I  made  good  and  went  to  New  York.  I  worked 
for  eleven  years  as  reporter  for  the  Sun,  several  years 
directly  under  the  great  Dana. 

"Interviews  with  big  men  were  my  specialty  and 
some  day  I  shall  write  my  reminiscences,  which  will, 


INBOOKSHOPS  73 


I  think,  make  interesting  reading.  I  inherited  the 
poetical  vein  from  my  father.  A  book  of  my  poems 
appears  this  month.  In  the  book  store  of  my  brother, 
who  sold  once  in  a  while  an  autograph  of  a  celebrity, 
I  met  several  collectors  and  studied  their  hobbies.  I 
saw  wide  possibilities  in  the  field  if  the  business  were 
handled  scientifically,  and  I  devoted  myself  to  it  ex- 
clusively. 

"In  September,  1887,  I  started  a  monthly  paper.  The 
Collector,  and  I  have  published  it  ever  since.  It 
reaches  not  only  my  customers  and  people  to  whom 
I  might  be  able  to  sell,  but  librarians  and  historians 
as  well,  and  it  is  largely  quoted  in  biographies  as  I 
reprint  unique  letters  and  documents  which  otherwise 
would  not  be  accessible  to  the  public. 

"So  you  see  I  am  an  editor  and  my  paper  is  the 
oldest  trade  paper  in  the  United  States — if  you  can 
call  it  a  trade  to  sell  literary  property. 

"An  autograph  collector  graduates  from  the  ranks 
of  book  collectors. 

"He  usually  begins  by  buying  letters  of  his  favorite 
authors  to  insert  in  their  works,  or  to  frame  with  their 
portraits.  Bit  by  bit  he  becomes  a  regular  collector. 
He  finds  that  autograph  letters  take  up  little  space 
compared  with  books,  and  that  they  are  far  less  liable 
to  injury  by  worms  or  decay.  A  well-selected  collec- 
tion of  autographs  will  nearly  always  prove  profitable 
at  an  auction  sale.  The  sale  draws  in  wealthy  buyers 
whom  the  dealers  never  reach  and  their  competition 
ensures  high  prices. 

"Genuine  autograph  collecting  has  nothing  to  do 
with  autograph  fiends  and  their  collecting  of  sig- 
natures. A  large  collection  of  signatures  well  ar- 
ranged and  illustrated  with  portraits  and  clippings,  is 
a  good  thing — but  albums  of  miscellaneous  signatures 
with  no  system,  and  begged  from  annoyed  celebrities, 
are  little  better  than  trash.  When  I  buy  such  a  col- 
lection I  break  it  up  at  once.  Notes  responding  to 
requests  for  autographs  are  no  better  than  signatures. 
They  are  out  of  place  in  a  good  collection.  A  letter 
should  contain  some  of  the  original  thought  of  the 


74  ADVENTURES 


writer,  and,  if  possible  refer  to  incidents  of  his  life  or 
to  his  writings. 

"My  regular  customers,  people  who  buy  constantly 
whenever  I  have  something  to  offer  them  in  their  spe- 
cial line,  are  not  the  movie  millionaires  you  can  meet 
in  the  art  shops  and  book  shops  on  Fifth  Avenue. 
They  are  usually  retired  business  men,  and  physicians, 
well-to-do  or  of  moderate  means,  university  professors 
who  have  to  save  in  order  to  be  able  to  buy  auto- 
graphs. Every  one  of  them  has  made  a  study  of  some 
literary  or  political  celebrity,  or  is  interested  in  some 
period  of  our  own  history.  All  documents  or  letters 
needed  to  complete  their  collections  are  welcome. 
But  I  also  count  among  my  patrons  of  long  standing, 
poor  men  whose  only  property  in  this  world  are  their 
collections  of  autographs,  and  they  actually  often  suf- 
fer privations  rather  than  part  with  their  treasures. 

"Some  people  are  greatly  interested  in  minor  liter- 
ary men  of  bygone  days,  whose  autographs  were  never 
thought  worth  saving.  I  have  a  search  department 
for  such  cases,  and  I  am  often  curiously  successful. 

"You  would  be  surprised  to  find  how  almost  any- 
thing you  may  want  can  be  found  if  you  do  not  tire 
in  looking  for  it  and  if  you  know  how  and  where  to 
advertise. 

"I  advertise  everywhere,  and  constantly.  The  small- 
est country  paper  sometimes  means  more  to  my  busi- 
ness than  the  big  city  paper. 

"I  have  bought  many  trunks  of  valuable  documents 
and  letters  in  the  garrets  of  old  homesteads  in  towns 
whose  names  you  have  never  heard  of — called  there 
by  some  heir,  who  read  my  advertisement  in  the  paper 
and  who  preferred  to  sell  the  literary  remains  of  his 
grandfather  to  me  rather  than  to  the  ragman! 

"And  here  is  the  secret  of  success  in  this  business: 
constant  and  wise  advertising. 

"Of  course  the  autographs  of  our  best  writers  are  in 
constant  demand.  They  have  a  market  price,  a  price, 
however,  which  fluctuates  almost  from  day  to  day. 

"For  instance,  if  a  man  dies,  his  value  goes  up  in- 
stantly, if  his  fame  has  not  been  an  overnight  popu- 


IN600KSH0PS  75 


larity.  On  the  other  hand,  the  signature  of  the  favor- 
ite actress  will  lose  all  value  at  her  death  and  will 
be  forgotten  by  the  public  as  well  as  by  the  autograph 
dealer. 

On  the  very  day  that  James  Whitcomb  Riley  was 
prostrated  by  a  paralytic  stroke  and  it  became  known 
that  he  would  never  be  able  to  use  his  right  hand 
again,  the  prices  of  his  manuscripts  and  letters  almost 
doubled. 

"Living  English  authors,  like  Kipling  or  Wells  or 
Chesterton,  fetch  higher  prices  here  than  in  England. 
Kipling  especially  brings  almost  five  times  as  much 
here  as  he  does  in  his  own  country. 

"Of  course  we  buy  at  auctions.  The  Anderson  Gal- 
leries are  noted  in  New  York  for  their  sales  and  so  is 
the  American  Art  Association.  Both  appeal  to  the 
collector  rather  than  to  the  dealer  and  prices  are  often 
prohibitive. 

"Values  are  being  created  there  and  it  very  often 
happens  that  some  collector  pays  five  hundred  dollars 
for  something  that  he  refused  to  pay  fifty  for  to  the 
dealer, 

"One  of  the  hobbies  of  American  collectors  is  a 
page  with  the  unbroken  lines  of  all  the  signatories  to 
the  Declaration  of  Independence.  Another  favorite 
object  is  the  signatures  of  the  presidents  of  the  United 
States.  I  pay  a  good  deal  of  attention  to  the  latter, 
having  collected  them  myself.  Do  you  want  to  hear 
my  opinion  of  the  handwritings  of  our  various  presi- 
dents and  some  natural  conclusions  reached  as  to  their 
character? 

"Most  of  them  wrote  a  good  clear  hand.  At  seven- 
teen years  of  age  Washington  wrote  a  clear,  round 
hand,  upright  with  a  tendency  to  ornamentation  of 
the  capital  letters.  In  1760  he  wrote  a  smooth,  run- 
ning hand,  and  during  the  war  of  the  Revolution  this 
changed  to  the  large  beautiful  round  hand,  the  finest 
specimen  of  writing  of  which  I  have  any  knowledge. 
This  persisted  to  his  death. 

"John  Adams  wrote  an  up-and-down,  round  hand, 
rather    small,    early    in    life,    and    gradually   growing 


76  ADVENTURES 


larger  until  the  individual  letters  were  bigger  than 
those  made  by  any  other  president.  At  the  end,  when 
his  sight  failed,  his  writing  became  an  irregular  scrawl 
— on  and  off  the  line. 

"Thomas  Jefferson  started  with  a  fluent  running 
hand,  and  this  characteristic  his  signature  retained 
throughout  his  life.  Shortly  before  the  Revolution  his 
hand  changed  to  a  round,  upright  form  and  so  con- 
tinued. 

"James  Monroe  wrote  a  very  running  hand,  crowd- 
ing his  letters  together  and  often  going  off  the  line. 
He  fancied  a  heavy  writing  pen. 

"John  Quincy  Adams  wrote  a  plain,  perpendicular 
hand  with  no  ornamentation,  almost  a  backhand.  In 
late  years  it  showed  much  trembling  in  the  letters,  but 
remained  clear. 

"James  Buchanan  wrote  a  round,  running  hand, 
sometimes  large  and  sometimes  small,  with  each  let- 
ter well  formed.  His  writing  continued  the  same  all 
his  life. 

"Abraham  Lincoln  wrote  at  first  a  plain  running 
hand  with  letters  well  made  and  words  well  spaced. 
As  years  passed  it  became  more  upright  until  at  the 
end  it  was  straight  up  and  down. 

"Ulysses  S.  Grant  wrote  an  unformed  school-boy 
hand  when  he  left  West  Point.  This  improved  and 
became  firm,  but  was  never  a  good  hand.  Of  late 
years  it  was  a  running  hand,  with  letters  incomplete 
and  other  marks  of  haste.  On  the  whole,  one  of  the 
poorest  hands  of  the  lot. 

"James  A.  Garfield  wrote  a  handsome  running  hand 
when  a  general  in  the  army.  The  letters  were  well 
formed  and  the  words  well  separated.  Altogether  a 
fine,  clerkly  hand.  Later  it  became  irregular  and  tend- 
ed towards  the  upright,  and  lost  its  beauty. 

"Grover  Cleveland  began  with  a  large,  angular, 
running  hand,  and  gradually  changed  to  a  small,  lady- 
like hand  of  great  regularity.  At  first  it  was  like 
Madison's. 

"William  McKinley  wrote  a  fine  plain  running  hand. 


INBOOKSHOPS  n 


with  letters  well  formed  and  a  tendency  not  to  lift  the 
pen  between  words. 

"Theodore  Roosevelt  has  written  the  worst  hand  of 
any  of  the  Presidents.  The  letters  are  badly  formed, 
the  lines  in  poor  alignment  and  altogether'  they  have 
a  very  scratchy  appearance.  They  bear  marks  of 
haste,  of  a  mind  outrunning  the  pen. 

"William  H.  Taft  has  a  fine,  handsome,  regular, 
large  running  hand.     Altogether  a  handsome  letter. 

"Woodrow  Wilson  writes  a  very  handsome  hand, 
with  letters  well  made,  freely  running  in  straight  lines 
— altogether  of  the  copperplate  order.  His  letters 
seem  to  be  written  with  deliberation  and  care. 

"Washington  and  Polk  wrote  the  handsomest  let- 
ters, and  Roosevelt  and  Grant  the  scratchiest." 

Mr.  Benjamin  is  the  great  pioneer  in  his  chosen 
field,  the  prince  of  the  autograph-dealers.  The  money 
he  makes  in  autographs  he  invests  in  real  estate.  He 
owns  a  magnificent  summer  home,  and  all  because  he 
knows  how  to  buy  and  how  to  sell  letters  of  dead  and 
living  celebrities. 

The  Market  Price  of  Some  Autographs 

S.  L.  Clemens $11.50 

Thos.  De  Quincey 18.00 

George  Eliot 23.00 

Eugene    Field 31.00 

Alex.    Hamilton 50.00 

John   Paul   Jones 280.00 

Rudyard    Kipling 24.00 

R.  L.  Stevenson 100.00 

Alfred    Tennyson 28.00 

Wm.  Wordsworth 21.00 

Ben.   Franklin 132.50 

Geo.  Washington 227.50 

John    Adams 57.50 

Thos.  Jeflferson 37.50 

W.  H.  Harrison 24.00 

Zachary    Taylor 90.00 

Andrew    Johnson 120.00 

Wm.    McKinley 67.50 


78  ADVENTURE 


Theo.  Roosevelt 12.00 

W.  H.  Taft 55.00 

A.   Lincoln 210.00 

Mr.  Madigan's  Interesting  Shop 

A  complete  change  of  scene.  The  most  fashionable 
shopping  district  of  New  York,  just  around  the  cor- 
ner of  Fifth  Avenue  in  Forty-fifth  Street. 

A  window  filled  with  expensively  framed  auto- 
graphs marks  the  sanctum  of  Mr.  Francis  P.  Madigan. 
He  is  a  jovial  man  who  has  all  the  qualities  which 
make  for  the  success  of  our  Fifth  Avenue  art  shops. 
He  knows  when  to  stop  talking,  he  knows  when  to 
say  "the  word"  which  closes  the  deal:  he  sells  to  his 
customers,  they  do  not  buy  from  him.  The  high  walls 
are  hung  with  innumerable  autographs  in  appropriate 
frames,  signed  portraits  of  great  celebrities;  some  little 
drawings  and  sketches  by  lesser  known  artists — Mr. 
Madigan  also  dabbles  in  art.  His  specialty  is  selling 
books  signed  by  their  authors.  He  is  one  of  the  few 
men  who  realized  Oscar  Wilde's  importance  at  a  time 
when  no  one  paid  much  attention  to  this  unfortunate 
poet.  In  the  course  of  years  he  collected  a  mass  of 
Oscar  Wilde  material,  and  he  is  now  reaping  the 
harvest. 

I  spent  an  afternoon  in  his  shop.  Quite  a  study  for 
the  observer  of  human  souls  was  the  procession  of 
visitors  who  came  and  went  continuously.  They  pay 
for  autographs  of  men  who  never  could  even  sell  their 
work  during  their  lives.  Mr.  Madigan  has  sold  more 
Poe  material  during  the  last  ten  years  than  anybody 
else. 

Poor  Poe!  During  his  entire  literary  career  he 
hardly  got  in  direct  returns  as  much  money  as  this 
dealer  in  dead  men's  letters  receives  for  one  single 
epistle. 

The  Poet's  Income 

A  letter  of  Poe,  dated  New  York.  January  18,  1849, 
also  in  the  possession  of  Mr.  Madigan,  allows  us  to 
look  behind  the  scenes  of  a  literary  workshop  of  the 


INBOOKSHOPS  79 


early  fifties.  It  is  addressed  to  John  R.  Thompson, 
the  editor  of  the  Southern  Literary  Messenger,  one  of 
the  most  powerful  literary  magazines  of  the  time.  Pee 
ofifers  his  services  as  a  critic  at  the  rate  of  two  dollars 
a  page,  provided  Mr.  Thompson  obliges  himself  to 
take  not  less  than  five  pages  each  month.  The  irony 
of  fate  was  never  better  exemplified.  The  manuscript 
which  he  offered  at  two  dollars  a  page  is  now  worth 
four  hundred  and  fifty  dollars.  The  very  letter  in' 
which  he  offers  to  sell  it  at  that  sum  was  purchased 
a  short  time  ago  for  five  hundred  dollars. 

"New  York,  Jan.  13,  '49. 
"My  Dear  Sir: 

"Accept  my  thanks  for  the  two  Messengers  contain- 
ing Miss  Talley's  'Genius.'  I  am  glad  to  see  that 
Griswold,  although  imperfectly,  has  done  her  justice 
in  his  late  'Female  Poets  of  America.' 

"Enclosed  I  send  you  the  opening  chapter  of  an 
article  called  'Marginalia,'  published  about  three  years 
ago  in  The  Democratic  Reineuf.  .  .  .  My  object  in 
writing  you  now  is  to  propose  that  I  continue  the 
papers  in  the  Messenger,  running  them  through  the 
year  at  the  rate  of  five  pages  each  month,  commencing 
with  the  March  number.  You  might  afford  me,  as 
before,  I  presume,  $2  a  page.  ...  If  you  think  well 
of  my  proposal,  I  will  send  you  the  two  first  num- 
bers (10  pp.)  immediately  on  receipt  of  a  letter  from 
you.  You  can  pay  me  at  your  convenience,  as  the 
papers  are  published  or  otherwise.  .  .  . 
"Very  truly  yours, 

"EDGAR  ALLAN  POE." 

"Jno.  R.  Thompson,  Esq. 

"P.  S. — I  am  about  to  bestir  myself  in  the  world 
of  letters  rather  more  busily  than  I  have  done  for 
three  or  four  years  past,  and  a  connection  which  I 
have  established  with  two  weekly  papers  may  enable 
me,  now  and  then,  to  serve  you  in  respect  to  The  Mes- 
senger. 

Our  interview  was  interrupted  by  a  handsome  youth 
with  a  fashionable  fur  coat  and  who  used  very  broken 
English. 


80        *  ADVENTURES 


He  desired  to  buy  autographs  of  French  "big 
people,"  and  of  composers  and  of  musicians  of  all  na- 
tions. Mr.  Madigan  brought  out  his  royalty  port- 
folios. Louis  XIV.  and  Marie  Antoinette  were  the 
star  pieces.  The  youth  did  not  hesitate  long.  He 
bought  them  and  took  about  two  dozen  letters  of 
musical  people.  He  ordered  them  all  framed  and  sent 
up  to  his  studio.  He  offered  English  bank  notes  in 
payment  of  the  bill  (some  four  hundred  odd  dollars), 
but  Mr.  Madigan  insisted  on  receiving  United  States 
currency,  and  so  the  man  went  to  a  nearby  bank,  re- 
turned shortly,  and  paid. 

"What  does  he  want  with  them?"  I  asked,  aston- 
ished. 

The  whole  transaction  had  lasted  less  than  fifteen 
minutes. 

"He  is  a  musician,"  replied  Mr.  Madigan,  "who  will 
play  the  social  game.  He  will  invite  some  very  rich 
people  to  his  studio,  the  walls  will  be  hung  with  the 
autographs  he  has  just  bought,  and  he'll  tell  them 
about  his  'dear'  relics  of  his  ancestors  and  will  also 
point  familiarly  to  his  'dear'  friends  the  musicians  and 
composers. 

"If  he  succeeds  in  his  game,  he  will  keep  the  auto- 
graphs, but  most  likely  he  will  come  back  to  me  in 
six  months  or  sooner,  financially  embarrassed,  and 
will  beg  of  me  to  buy  them  back." 

A  well-known  poet  came  in.  Mr.  Madigan  took  him 
to  the  back  of  the  store.  The  poet  wrote  for  a  little 
while  and  then  handed  the  sheet  of  paper  to  Madigan. 
A  short  conversation  in  subdued  tones,  and  the  poet 
left  the  shop.  Madigan  told  me  that  the  poet  had 
written  an  extemporaneous  ode  on  Oscar  Wilde.  "He 
often  comes  in,"  Mr.  Madigan  continued,  "for  a  chat 
and  presents  me  quite  frequently  with  a  few  lines  of 
his  poetry.  Once  he  had  not  left  the  shop  more  than 
half  an  hour.  I  sold  the  poem  he  had  just  written  to 
another  friend  of  mine  for  ten  dollars." 

An  old  lady  entered.  She  unwrapped  a  parcel  that 
she  had  carried  under  her  arm.  A  lot  of  letters  and 
photographs.     I    felt  that   she   resented   my   presence 


INBOOKSHOPS  81 


during  the  coming  transaction.  I  turned  my  back.  I 
listened  to  a  long  lecture  by  Mr.  Madigan  about  the 
cheapness  and  undesirability  of  the  autographs  which 
she  offered  to  him  for  sale.  Finally  he  offered  a  few 
dollars  and  the  old  lady,  reluctantly,  pocketed  the 
money  and  left  her  parcel. 

A  yourg  woman  entered  next — an  mterior  deco- 
rator doing  Mrs.  Van  X's  breakfast  room.  It  had 
come  into  her  head  that  Cardinal  Richelieu's  picture 
and  signature  in  that  charming  Louis  Quatorze  frame 
would  be  ideal  between  the  lavender  window  hang- 
ings.    She  asked  the  price  and  had  it  sent. 

A  newspaper  man  was  the  next  visitor.  He  wanted 
a  picture  of  Stephen  Crane,  the  poet,  to  illustrate  a 
Sunday  story.  Mr.  Madigan  fished  out  a  portrait 
from  many  others,  card  indexed  and  filed  away  in  a 
specially  constructed  cabinet. 

And  so  it  goes  on  continuously,  the  whole  day, 
buying  and  selling. 

Schulte's  Book  Store 

Scattered  about  the  throbbing  city  are  a  few  quiet 
nooks  and  corners  that  seem  especially  made  for  the 
lover  of  antiques.  They  are  not  numerous,  but  full  of 
a  certain  charm.  Book  stores,  with  big  boxes  in  front 
of  the  doors,  where  you  can  choose  for  your  pennies, 
tomes  in  old-fashioned  binding  and  printing.  Inside 
are  shelves  laden  with  books  in  delightful  disorder  left 
by  the  book-hunter  who  looked  through  them  before 
you.  The  narrow  passageway  becomes  narrower  on 
each  visit  you  pay  to  the  shop  because  of  newly- 
arrived  books  and  pamphlets. 

A  long  vista  of  boxes  and  cases  well  filled  with  a 
delightful  miscellany  of  books  marks  the  front  of 
Mr.  Schulte's  book  store  on  the  southwest  corner  of 
23rd  Street  and  Lexington  Avenue.  Don't  cast  suspi- 
cious looks  at  the  nice  girls  in  immaculate  white 
blouses  who  loiter  about  the  aisles.  They  won't  in- 
terfere with  you.  They  won't  ask  you  any  questions. 
You  will  soon  feel  at  home  after  you  have  glanced  at 
the  titles  of  the  books  on  any  shelf,  and  if  you  meet 


82  ADVENTURES 


Mr.  Schulte  he  won't  be  a  stranger  to  you.  There  is 
such  a  deep-founded  relationship  between  the  man  and 
his  books  and  customers.  He  is  the  appreciative, 
sympathetic  co-collector  and,  after  you  have  gained 
his  confidence,  if  the  friendship  is  mutual,  he  will 
spread  out  his  gems  before  you:  a  first  edition  with  a 
rare  imprint,  or  some  unknown  etching  by  Whistler 
or  Haden  or  Zorn. 

George  D.  Smith,  Speculator  in  Literary  Property 

A  new  type  of  bookseller  has  developed  since  books 
and  literary  property  have  become  commercial  and 
subject  to  corners  created  by  shrewd  buyers  and  hold- 
ers, and  to  fluctuations  caused  by  selling  en  masse. 
Mr.  George  D.  Smith,  the  king  of  rare  books  and 
great  dealer  in  literary  property,  operates  on  the 
largest  scale. 

Mr.  Smith  buys  carloads  of  books  for  millions  of 
dollars  and  sells  again  by  the  carload  to  millionaires 
who  build  palaces  in  California  and  who  order  their 
libraries  complete.  Mr.  Smith  is  the  leading  figure  in 
our  auction  houses  where  he  buys,  excluding  all  com- 
petition, by  paying  an  exorbitant  price  for  anything 
he  desires  to  possess.  He  is  a  millionaire  and  the 
chief  counsellor  of  our  nouveaux  riches  when  they 
furnish  their  homes  with  rare  autographs  and  valuable 
books. 

Mr.   Cadigan  of  Brentano's 

After  you  have  passed  the  stairway  in  Brentano's 
leading  to  the  basement  and  properly  admired  the 
framed  autographs  and  signed  portraits  which  cover 
the  walls,  you  will  pass  the  gate  that  leads  into  the 
kingdom  of  Mr.  Cadigan,  another  dealer  in  literary 
property  but  of  quite  a  different  type.  Mr.  Cadigan 
is  the  head  of  Brentano's  periodical  department.  He 
knows  the  development  of  the  American  magazine 
better  than  anybody  else  living.  For  a  score  of  years 
he  has  watched  successes  and  failures,  but  nearest  to 
his  heart  are  the  magazines  of  those  men  who  have 


INBOOKSHOPS  83 


had  the  courage  to  stand  up  for  their  own  ideas  and 
their  own  conception  of  the  world. 

Some  of  the  most  pathetic  figures  in  American  let- 
ters have  founded  magazines  of  their  own;  they  would 
not  follow  the  example  of  their  contemporaries  or 
submit  to  the  wishes  of  their  publishers  and  to  the 
presumed  desires  of  the  reading  public.  Mr,  Cadigan 
knows  them  all.  He  recommends  them  if  he  thinks 
them  commendable.  While  the  gigantic  trusts  of  our 
American  news  companies  aflFord  them  very  little  or 
no  chances  for  circulation,  Mr.  Cadigan  adopts  them 
and  presents  them  for  sale  on  his  tables  next  to  the 
full-fledged  products  of  the  capitalistic  press. 

I  get  more  satisfaction  and  pleasure  out  of  Bren- 
tano's  basement  devoted  to  periodicals  than  out  of  all 
the  periodical  reading  rooms  of  all  our  public  libraries 
combined,  with  the  Carnegie  institutions  thrown  in. 
To  be  able  to  look  over  the  current  issues  of  maga- 
zines and  to  take  home  just  the  interesting  ones  car- 
ries with  it  an  intimate  satisfaction. 


1917 


84  ADVENTURES 


Young  Madigan 

EVERYBODY  calls  him  young  Madigan  to  dis- 
tinguish him  from  his  father,  "old"  Madigan,  the 
dean  of  the  autograph  craft  in  the  United  States. 
Tom  Madigan  is  young  in  years;  about  twenty-five; 
but  he  was  bred  among  autographs.  There  is  a  lot  of 
romance  and  excitement  in  finding  autographs.  It 
stirred  the  imagination  of  the  boy.  While  his  school- 
mates indulged  in  Indian  stories  and  enthused  them- 
selves with  the  mysteries  of  Sherlock  Holmes,  Tom 
Madigan  went  about  searching  for  autographs.  Old 
country  houses,  dilapidated  and  deserted  mansions, 
garrets  even  were  his  hunting  grounds.  He  had  a 
wonderful  scent.  He  found  old  trunks  with  letters 
and  manuscripts,  boxes  with  documents  and  deeds, 
and  his  father  taught  him  to  separate  the  chaflf  from 
the  wheat. 

Tom  read  a  good  deal.  History  and  biography 
mostly.  He  became  his  father's  walking  encyclopedia. 
There  is  a  good  deal  of  the  born  reporter  in  Tom,  and 
at  a  tender  age,  he  discovered  his  literary  inclina- 
tions. His  autographs  furnished  his  material,  dead 
letters  became  alive  in  his  hands,  magazines  and  jour- 
nals were  glad  to  print  his  rambles  and  discoveries. 
We  thank  him  for  a  good  many  sidelights  upon  the 
private  life  of  illustrious  personages.  One  day  Tom 
disappeared.  The  fact  is  he  got  married  and  started 
a  shop  of  his  own.  Knowledge  was  his  only  capital, 
and  today  at  the  age  of  twenty-five  he  ranks  among 
the  first  autograph  dealers  in  America. 

"Yes,  we  have  to  get  high  prices  for  autographs," 
Madigan  said,  smilingly,  while  opening  his  enormous 
safe  to  show  me  some  specimens.  "I  believe  this  is  in 
some  respects  the  finest  tribute  the  present  genera- 
tion pays  to  genius  and  greatness.  These  prices  are 
suggestive  of  reflection,  however,  in  view  of  the  now 
almost  universal  practice  of  typewriting  letters  and 
manuscripts. 

"The  written  word,  as  it  flows  from  the  pen,  has 


INBOOKSHOPS  85 


much  of  the  inspiration,  the  mental  process  and  the 
ideals  of  the  writer;  the  typewritten  word  tells  noth- 
ing. 

"President  McKinley,  to  give  one  instance,  was  an 
early  user  of  the  typewriter,  and  therefore,  manu- 
script letters  by  his  hand  are  exceedingly  scarce, 
scarcer  and  more  expensive  than  long  letters  by  Presi- 
dent Adams,  Jeflferson,  Madison  or  Jackson.  And  I 
dare  say  that  these  will  be  far  easier  to  procure  in 
coming  years  than  like  specimens  by  Roosevelt,  Taft 
or  Wilson. 

"Here,  look  at  this  letter  written  by  John  Adams. 
Isn't  it  a  delicious  bit  of  intimate  history  that  unrolls 
itself  before  our  eyes?  Adams,  de  jure  leader  of  the 
Federalist  party  while  Alexander  Hamilton  has  the 
actual  power,  is  peeved  about  'too  much  intrigue  in 
this  business  both  in  General  Washington  and  me.' 
'//  /  shall  ultimately  be  the  dupe  of  it,  I  am  much  mis- 
taken in  myself.'  And  now  read  this  memorable  line : 
'//  /  could  resign  him  the  office  of  President,  I  would  do 
it  immediately  and  with  the  highest  pleasure;  but  I  never 
send  I  would  hold  the  office  and  be  responsible  for  it^ 
exercise  while  he  should  execute  it. 

"Look  at  this  letter  by  Henry  Clay,  ^Although  I  am  not 
a  member  of  any  Christian  Church,  I  have  a  profound 
sense  of  the  inappreciable  value  of  our  religion,  which 
has  increased  and  strengthened  as  I  have  advanced  in 
years.' 

Read  this  note  of  Robert  Fulton's,  the  celebrated 
inventor,  to  his  lawyer  referring  to  a  Mr.  Church,  his 
partner,  in  an  'enterprise  of  small  canals.'  'By  becoming 
a  partner  he  took  a  chance  of  profit  or  loss,  but  wajj 
bomid  to  pay  me  the  purchase  money.  He  failed  in  his 
second  payment.  I  consequently  stayed  in  Europe,  not 
regarding  a  man  who  had  no  regard  for  his  engage- 
ments." 

"Look  at  this  distinguished  handwriting  of  Dante 
Gabriel  Rossetti.     Can  you  read  between  the  lines? 

"  7  lent  you  by  mistake  a  copy  of  my  book,  which 
contains  corrections  which  I,  therefore,  need  in  prepar- 
ing the  next  edition.' 


86  ADVENTURES 


"Can  you  imagine  the  poet  hunting  for  his  corrected 
book,  the  printer  waiting  until  he  discovers  that  some 
friend  has  carried  it  away?  And  here  is  a  sauve  note 
of  John  S.  Sargent,  the  American  portrait  painter, 
asking  some  society  woman  in  words  of  utmost  polite- 
ness to  come  to  his  studio  for  a  sitting.  One  almost 
can  see  the  $5,000  check  paid  for  the  painting. 

"Here  read  the  fuming  indignation  of  an  American 
poet.  A  letter  by  Bayard  Taylor,  whose  London 
publishers  had  refused  to  publish  his  'Masque  of  the 
Gods.'  He  writes  about  English  prudery  to  James  R. 
Osgood,  his  American  publisher.  7  return  the  tzvo  Lon- 
don letters.  What  prigs  the  publishers  there  must  be. 
It  is  very  evident  they  are  afraid,  though  why  I  can't 
see  for  the  life  of  me.     If  there  is  reason  for  it,  then 

you  are  the  boldest  of  the  bold //  you  see 

any  unusually  spicy  or  stupid  attacks,  I  should  be  greatly 
obliged  if  you  would  send  them.' 

"Lucy  Larcon  is  an  American  poetess,  who  is  not 
very  well  known,  but  I  think  this  little  poem,  evidently 
never  published  before,  is  not  bad: 

"I  said  it  in  the  meadow-path; 

I   say  it  on  the  mountain  stairs; 
The  best   things  any   mortal   hath 

Are  those  that   every   mortal   shares." 

1918 


INBOOKSHOPS  87 


The  Romance  of  a  Chicago  Book  Dealer 

WELLS  Street,  between  the  river  and  East  Chi- 
cago Avenue,  is  the  Bowery  of  Chicago.  Once 
a  residential  section,  now  the  old  mansions  and 
frame  cottages,  hastily  erected  after  the  fire,  are  dilap- 
idated and  are  used  as  lodging  houses  and  factories  of 
the  inferior  sort.  Here  and  there  a  modern  structure, 
a  storage  house  or  an  industrial  plant.  Dan  Martin's 
Mission  is  here,  several  rescue  halls,  a  Salvation  Army 
citadel,  the  famous  coffee  wagons  on  the  corners  of 
side  streets,  where  unfortunates  are  given  a  cup  of 
coffee,  a  loaf  of  bread  and  advice  that  should  lead 
to  salvation.  The  Moody  church  is  the  aristocrat  of 
the  quarter.  Drunken  men  and  women  line  the  side- 
walks day  and  night;  gruesome  phonographs  are  con- 
tinually heard  in  rum  shops.  Policemen  patrol  in 
pairs,  and  this  beat  is  considered  the  most  dangerous 
in  the  whole  city. 

In  the  midst  of  one  of  the  worst  blocks  is  a  large 
show  window.  A  pawnbroker  would  be  most  appro- 
priate in  these  surroundings.  But  it  is  not  a  pawn- 
broker's display;  there  are  paintings  and,  if  you 
choose  to  step  nearer  to  examine  them,  you  will 
scarcely  believe  your  own  eyes:  a  couple  of  portraits 
by  Benjamin  West,  signed;  a  magnificent  etching  by 
Whistler,  with  the  familiar  butterfly  in  the  left  hand 
corner ;  high  up  near  the  ceiling,  between  mischievous 
gargoyles,  a  large  canvas  which  one  recognizes  as  a 
magnificent  work  of  an  Italian  master.  A  few  Duer- 
ers  are  pinned  to  the  wall,  rows  of  old  books,  not 
dusted  for  a  long  while,  are  on  shelves  in  the  cen- 
ter. 

"If  these  things  are  genuine,"  I  thought,  "they  are 
priceless  treasures;  of  course  they  cannot  be."  I 
entered  the  shop.  There  was  just  enough  space  to 
open  the  door,  to  squeeze  in:  piles  of  books  from  the 
floor  to  the  very  high  ceiling,  drawings,  paintings, 
carvings,  leaned  against  the  dusty  backgrounds  of  old 
tomes.     It  was  the  most  extraordinary  place   I   had 


88  ADVENTURES 


ever  entered.  There  seemed  to  be  some  order  in  this 
most  astonishing  disorder.  A  little  bell  sounded  some- 
where in  the  faraway  background.  It  was  a  very 
long  room.  I  heard  approaching  footsteps,  very  en- 
ergetic footsteps.  I  was  astonished  that  a  person 
could  worm  his  way  through  an  almost  invisible  pas- 
sage between  the  heaped-up  stacks  of  volumes — an 
old  gentleman  with  hair  hanging  to  his  shoulders,  a 
long  beard,  wonderful  eyes  which  seemed  to  sparkle 
in  the  dim  light  of  the  strange  place.  I  liked  him  at 
once;  his  quiet  melodious  voice,  his  dreaming  faraway 
look  and  the  decision  of  his  manner.  I  told  him 
frankly  that  the  strangeness  of  the  place,  in  such 
strange  surroundings,  had  attracted  me.  I  came  again 
and  again.  And  I  treasure  the  hours  I  spent  in  Mr. 
Doerner's  "book-shop"  as  among  the  most  pleasant 
of  my  life.  I  never  grew  tired  of  standing  up  there. 
There  was  no  space  for  a  chair,  and  I  doubt  if  there 
was  a  chair  in  the  place. 

I  think  it  a  sacrilege  to  call  Julius  Doerner  a  book 
seller  or  antique  dealer.  He  is  a  collector  and  an 
antiquarian.  He  knows  his  books,  and  has  more  than 
half  a  million  of  them.  He  treasures  his  works  of 
art,  delights  in  showing  them  to  you,  but  selling?  that 
is  another  question.  There  is  not  a  phase  of  Ameri- 
can history  he  could  not  lecture  on  with  more  thor- 
oughness than  any  American  University  professor. 
His  collection  of  pamphlets,  of  the  earliest  newspapers 
and  periodicals,  his  gift  of  finding  important  con- 
temporary notices  relating  to  American  history,  in 
foreign  journals,  books  and  chronicles,  is  remark- 
able. I  thought  him  an  eccentric  gentleman  of  means, 
who  after  extensive  travel  round  the  world,  had  de- 
cided to  lead  the  life  of  a  hermit  among  his  treasures. 
He  had,  in  fact,  traveled  very  little;  collecting  had 
been  his  passion  from  earliest  youth;  he  had  denied 
himself  for  almost  three  decades  the  comforts  and 
good  things  of  this  world;  and  he  had  found  a  very 
efficient  way  of  beating  our  high  cost  of  living. 

"It  is  not  the  high  cost  of  living,"  he  used  to  say, 
"it  is  the  cost  of  high  living  that  troubles  the  world. 


IN     BOOK    SHOPS  89 


For  years  I  have  expended  seven  cents  a  day  for  my 
living  expenses,  and  you  can  see,  yourself,  that  I  am 
strong  and  healthy." 

He  is  an  excellent  musician.  Beneath  thousands  of 
pounds  of  books  an  old-fashioned  piano  is  buried  in 
his  shop.  He  called  the  pile  of  material,  that  had  to 
be  removed  before  he  could  open  the  instrument,  his 
time  clock.  Every  once  in  a  while  he  would  forget 
his  work  (which  consisted  mostly  of  reading  and 
compiling)  and  would  devote  himself  with  all  the 
fervor  of  an  enthusiast  to  Beethoven,  Bach  or  Mozart. 

Very  few  customers  come  to  his  place  of  business. 
If  some  curiosity  seeker,  like  myself,  attempts  to 
break  into  his  sanctum,  they  find  in  him  a  courteous 
but  not  inviting  or  solicitous  shop  keeper.  "What  do 
you  want?"  is  his  curt  question.  If  a  book  is  asked 
for,  he  will  fish  it  out  from  among  his  five  hundred 
thousand  books  with  an  almost  miraculous  quickness, 
name  the  price,  and  then  it  is  up  to  the  customer  to 
say  "Yes"  or  "No,"  and  the  interview  is  ended.  His 
treasures  are  all  "finds."  He  discovered  them  in  junk 
shops,  in  garrets  of  old  mansions,  in  unpromising 
trunks  of  storage  houses.  There  is,  for  instance,  a 
most  magnificent  soft-shell  cameo,  a  biblical  scene, 
marvelous  workmanship  of  some  exquisite  artist  of 
the  early  Italian  renaissance.  He  bought  it  from  a 
pawnbroker  for  five  dollars.  He  refused  a  staggering 
sum  from  Tiffany's  and  resisted  the  very  tempting 
price  which  Mrs.  Potter-Palmer  was  willing  to  pay  for 
it,  not  because  he  did  not  need  the  money  or  was 
holding  out  for  a  larger  profit  (the  sum  offered  him 
was  two  thousand  dollars,  I  believe),  but  because  he 
preferred  to  have  the  cameo  himself. 

Quite  a   Romance 

Someone  who  has  known  Mr.  Doerner  since  his 
first  arrival  in  Chicago  told  me  his  story.  He  was  a 
civil  engineer,  and  lost  his  wife  and  child  in  the  same 
year.  Grief  and  disappointment  turned  him  against 
his  profession.  He  inherited  at  this  time  something 
like  twenty  acres  of  land  in  Chicago,  which  were  in 


90  ADVENTURES 


those  days  outside  the  city  limits,  but  are  now  the 
most  valuable  property  in  the  city.  He  was  waiting 
for  a  final  settlement  of  the  estate,  and  used  his  idle 
hours  looking  about  the  book-shops  in  Chicago.  Soon 
he  was  well  known  and  well  liked  by  all  the  book 
dealers.  He  purchased  books  and  his  knowledge  of 
books  was  astonishing.  About  twenty  years  ago  Chi- 
cago was  a  great  center  for  book  auctions.  Ship 
loads  of  books  from  England  were  sold  here,  and 
Mr.  Doerner  soon  became  a  frequenter  of  the  auction 
rooms.  Early  printed  books  were  his  hobby.  Once 
he  could  not  resist  and  put  in  his  bid  of  several  hun- 
dred dollars  for  a  rare  collection.  The  books  went  to 
him.  He  could  not  pay,  but  gave  as  security  a  mort- 
gage on  his  legacy.  In  subsequent  auctions  he 
bought  large  lots,  increasing  the  mortgage  upon  his 
real  estate.  Then  came  the  day  when  the  auctioneers 
demanded  payment.  They  foreclosed  the  mortgage, 
bought  Mr.  Doerner's  property  at  auction  for  a  ridic- 
ulously small  amount  of  money,  at  once  quit  the  book 
auction  business,  parceled  out  Mr.  Doerner's  twenty 
acres  of  land  into  building  lots,  and  became — mil- 
lionaires. 

Mr.  Doerner  bore  his  misfortune  with  equanimity. 
He  continued  his  regular  trips  to  the  book  dealers  and 
one  day  a  proposition  was  put  before  him.  A  book- 
seller on  Wells  Street,  one  of  the  oldest  in  the  city, 
died  suddenly,  and  his  stock  of  books  had  to  be  cata- 
logued in  order  to  be  sold  at  public  auction  for  the 
benefit  of  his  estate: 

"Would  Mr.  Doerner  undertake  to  catalogue  the 
stock  and  appraise  it;  the  estate  would  pay  him  three 
dollars  per  day  for  his  services?"  Mr.  Doerner  ac- 
cepted, and,  to  make  the  story  short,  at  the  end  of 
six  months,  the  cataloguing  and  appraising  were  not 
yet  finished,  the  book-seller's  heirs  were  unwilling  to 
pay  Mr.  Doerner's  fees,  which  amounted  to  several 
hundred  dollars,  upon  the  dubious  chance  of  reim- 
bursement by  public  auction: 

"Would  Mr.  Doerner  accept  the  books,  themselves, 
in  payment  of  his  claim?"    He  would. 


INBOOKSHOPS  91 


And  so  he  found  himself  the  proprietor  of  a  book 
shop. 

Mr.  Doerner  has  made  discoveries  during  his  career 
which  were  of  the  utmost  importance  to  American 
history.  His  collection  of  paintings,  especially  of 
American  paintings,  would  fill  a  private  museum.  He 
hates  commercialism,  he  loves  weak  humanity,  and, 
strange  to  say,  the  disreputable  men  and  women  of 
Wells  Street  love  him,  and  he  and  his  possessions  are 
safe  in  the  most  dangerous  part  of  the  city. 

Or  is  it  true,  as  he  once  answered  in  a  rather  pes- 
simistic mood:  "If  they  suspected  that  I  had  only  one 
thirty-second  carat  of  a  diamond  in  my  place,  they 
would  murder  me  and  loot  my  shop  in  order  to  find  it. 
But  books  or  paintings,  who  cares  for  them  in 
America?" 

Frank  Morris  and  His  Famous  Shop 

Chicago  had  a  great  literary  period  in  the  nineties. 
Eugene  Field  had  come  to  the  Western  metropolis 
and  was  in  the  early  stage  of  his  fame.  Stanley 
Waterloo  had  written  his  books,  the  White  Chapel 
Club  was  in  its  flower,  Oppie  Reed  and  Bill  Nye 
carried  the  strangest  legends  of  Chicago  throughout 
the  United  States  on  their  more  or  less  romantic 
"lecture"  tours.  Ben  King's  funeral  had  created  a  sen- 
sation all  over  the  United  States.  The  World  Fair 
brought  a  great  influx  of  English  poets  and  writers  to 
Chicago.  Cowly  Stapleton  Brown  had  started  his 
unforgetable  Goose  Quill  in  which  he  predicted  twenty- 
four  years  ago  that  Kipling  had  sung  his  swan 
song  in  "Plain  Tales  of  the  Hills,"  that  Hall  Caine 
would  sink  into  oblivion  after  a  few  seasons  of  best- 
seller notoriety.  He  paid  in  the  Goose  Quill  homage 
to  the  genius  of  Oscar  Wilde,  and  to  the  man  who 
wrote  the  Elder  Conklin  stories.  Kimball  and  Stone 
established  their  Chap  Books  in  which  America  was 
given  a  chance  to  get  acquainted  with  Ernest  Dowson, 
Aubrey  Beardsly,  John  Davidson,  Stephane  Mallarme, 
Verlaine,   Joseph   Peledan,   Villiers   de   L'Isle   Adam, 


92  ADVENTURES 


Baudelaire  here  found  their  first  translations,  and  un- 
til today  the  Chicago  Chap  Book  remains  the  only 
source  of  information  of  the  lives  and  times  of  the 
French  decadents.  Bill  Eaton  then  was  the  great  dra- 
matic critic  who  had  had  his  season  in  London  and 
had  come  back  as  the  only  American  who  in  one  year 
had  acquired  a  perfect  English  accent.  Col.  Bill  Vis- 
scher,  the  farrious  Confederate  editor  and  singer  of 
the  Southern  States  had  completed  his  eleven  hundred 
and  fifty-sixth  patriotic  song  and  had  issued  his  senti- 
mental "In  the  Canoe." 

And  all  this  time  Frank  Morris'  little  book  shop 
on  West  Madison  Street  was  the  center  of  the  very 
select  among  artists  and  literati.  Frank  Morris  was 
the  friend  of  all  of  them.  In  his  shop  they  used  to 
assemble  and  talk  of  future  glories  and  the  fame  of 
the  past.  Everybody  loved  Frank,  and  many  were 
homeless  after  his  shop  had  fallen  victim  to  the 
flames.  But  soon  he  was  established  again,  on  Adams 
Street.  Those  of  his  old  friends  who  were  left  fol- 
lowed him  there,  and  now,  after  times  of  storm,  he  is 
settled  in  new  quarters  in  the  Marshall  Field  Build- 
ing. There  is  no  more  genial  man  to  talk  to  than 
Frank.  He  is  not  only  a  seller  of  books,  but  is  a  part 
of  the  most  important  period  of  American  literature, 
of  our  famous  nineties.  Many  poets  have  written 
poems  to  Frank  Morris.  Here  are  two  by  Eugene 
Field. 


TO  FRANK  MORRIS: 

Believe  me  by  all  those  endearing  old  charms 

With  which  your  quaint  shop  is  provided, 

I  shall  honor  the  trade  by  whose  help  I  have  made 

A   collection   of   freaks   thats  derided. 

And  if  you  believe  me — when  then  I've  to  ask 

That,   till   fortune   betimes   readjusts  me 

With  dollars  and  dimes  for  my  yarns  and  my  rhymes. 

You  still   shall  continue  to  trust  me. 

EUGENE  FIELD. 
October,  1889. 


INBOOKSHOPS  93 


LINES  WRITTEN  UNDER  PORTRAIT  OF  F.  M.  M.: 

This  is  the   robber,  as   sure  as  you're  born, 
Against  whose  guile  I  fain  would  warn 
The  bibliomaniac,  tattered  and  torn, 
Who  pauses  to  look  at   some   second-hand  bopk 
That  lies  on  the  shelf  all  covered  with  dust 
And  is   marked  "four  dollars   for  cash — no   trust" 
In  a  gloomy  corner  that  smells  of  must 
Down   in  the   shop   that  Morris   built! 

EUGENE   FIELD. 
1888. 

Powner's  Book  Shop 

No,  there  is  no  accident,  no  riot  on  the  corner  of 
Clark  Street,  opposite  the  City  Hall.  The  scrambling 
mass  of  people  are  simply  book  lovers  and  book  col- 
lectors, and  Powner's  has  got  in  a  new  consignment 
of  books.  Such  scenes  occur  every  Saturday.  The 
big  stalls  in  front  of  the  shop  are  filled  with  all  sorts 
of  books,  old  Roman  antiquities,  books  on  sports,  old 
poetry,  collected  by  someone  who  had  disposed  of  his 
books,  or  who  had  left  his  treasures  behind  him.  Mr. 
Powner  used  to  be  a  school  teacher  in  Greensburg, 
Indiana,  and  he  started  his  book  business  about  twelve 
years  ago  with  the  thoroughness  of  a  school  master. 
Rare  and  valuable  books  are  his  own  special  depart- 
ment, and  he  leaves  modern  books  entirely  to  his 
clerks. 

His  shop  today  is  the  center  for  the  Chicago  col- 
lectors. The  human  interest  he  takes  in  his  custom- 
ers is  that  of  a  real  antiquarian.  Everybody  is  at  home 
in  his  shop.  He  doesn't  begrudge  anyone  finding  a 
gem  on  his  "quarter  counter."  Last  week,  for  in- 
stance, some  lucky  chap  found  a  first  edition  of  Rous- 
seau's "Emile"  with  Rousseau's  autograph  presenta- 
tion inscription  to  the  King  and  the  royal  coat  of  arms 
on  the  binding,  and  bought  the  book  for  seventy-five 
cents.  "Such  things  may  happen,"  was  Mr.  Powner's 
remark  when  he  heard  of  the  transaction.  "I  am 
glad  he  got  it." 

Saturday  is  the  great  book  day.  In  the  back  room 
upon  empty  book  boxes  men  of  all  walks  of  life  sit 


94  ADVENTURES 


around,  prosperous  business  men,  millionaires,  who 
are  just  enjoying  living,  students,  newspaper  men  from 
the  nearby  newspaper  offices,  but  they  all  are  linked 
by  a  common  love.  They  are  all  ardent  book  col- 
lectors. 

There  are  a  good  many  other  book  shops  in  Chi- 
cago. There  is  Hill's,  who  caters  to  the  extravagant 
wishes  of  Western  millionaires.  Then  there  is  Mc- 
Clurge's,  the  Model  Book  Store,  conducted  like  a 
modern  department  store. 

But  then  there  is  the  unique  product  of  the  Chicago 
book  market,  the  peripatetic  book-seller.  Half  col- 
lector, half  merchant,  these  men  are  constantly  nosing 
about  shops,  picking  up  books  in  Powner's,  for  in- 
stance, for  twenty-five  cents  and  selling  them  at  once 
for  two  dollars  and  a  half  to  Mr.  Hill,  who  they  know 
has  an  inquiry  for  that  particular  copy.  They  love 
the  uncertainty  of  their  daily  bread.  Setting  out  in 
the  morning  upon  their  rounds,  they  look  forward  to 
their  finds  of  the  day.  In  a  junk  shop  they,  perhaps, 
will  run  across  one  of  those  scarce  items  which  are 
found  once  in  a  lifetime,  and  again  they  may  find 
nothing  but  worry  about  the  needs  of  the  day. 


1916 


INBOOKSHOPS  95 

Chicago  Revisited 

In  Memoriam  Julius  Doerner 

JULIUS  DOERNER  is  dead.  He  had  been  a  book 
dealer  after  his  own  heart.  Living  among  his 
books  was  his  delight.  He  bought  constantly,  sold 
little  and  read  much:  a  man  who  valued  his  books  by 
their  contents.  He  was  as  simple  as  a  girl  of  sixteen, 
a  bad  girl  of  sixteen. 

He  wore  an  alpaca  coat  and  panama  hat  winter  and 
summer,  in  snow  and  shine.  Both  were  bought  ten 
years  ago  at  a  Salvation  Army  store.  Cats  were 
Julius  Doerner's  only  companions;  stray  cats  picked 
up  on  dark  nights  in  alleys  and  doorways.  They 
were  named  after  the  days  of  the  week  on  which  he 
found  them.  He  never  had  more  than  fourteen. 
"Friday  Afternoon"  was  a  black  tom-cat  with  six  toes 
on  each  paw.  It  could  talk.  Doerner  said  so  and  he 
was  very  truthful.  He  hated  women  who  were  un- 
womanly, thought  policemen  incompetent,  and  lived 
on  seven  cents  a  day. 

He  loved  his  mother,  who  sent  him  a  fried  chicken 
every  Christmas,  half  a  turkey  on  each  Thanksgiving 
day,  and  who  brought  him  into  this  world  fifty-seven 
years   ago. 

He  loved  her  so  much  that  he  wanted  to  give  her 
a  gift  which  no  money  in  the  world  could  purchase — 
exclusive,  unique.  So,  he  bought  an  old  Washington 
hand  press,  rusty  and  prehistoric  type,  and  wrote  a 
book  for  her;  he  set  it  up  letter  by  letter,  word  by 
word,  line  by  line,  page  by  page;  distributing  the  type 
after  he  had  made  only  one  impression.  It  took  him 
three  years  to  complete  his  book.  It  took  him  another 
year  to  illuminate  it  with  rare  wood  cuts  by  Durer 
and  Kranach,  with  miniatures  taken  from  old  hand- 
written cloister  books.  He  bound  it  with  his  own 
hands,  and  tooled  the  leather  of  its  covers  with  ex- 
quisite golden  arabesques. 

His  old  mother  in  Pennsylvania  could  not  read  a 


96  ADVENTURES 


word  of  English,  though  born  and  brought  up  in 
America.     She  used  Pennsylvania  Dutch  exclusively. 

Julius  Doerner  never  slept  in  a  bed  but  was  accus- 
tomed to  sit  up  all  night  in  a  Morris  chair  in  the 
back  of  his  shop.  His  most  exquisite  pleasure,  and 
only  recreation  was  to  play  Bach,  Mozart  and  Beet- 
hoven on  an  old  spinet. 

He  wore  the  same  celluloid  collar  for  twelve  years, 
and  washed  it  every  Monday  morning  with  sapolio. 
The  same  cake  and  collar  were  purchased  from  a 
starving  peddler  on  a  very  cold  night,  as  an  alterna- 
tive to  giving  the  peddler  two  bits  for  a  night's  lodg- 
ing. 

Goethe  and  Franz  Lieber  were  his  favorites;  Whit- 
man, Poe  and  Wilde,  his  vaudeville  stage. 

He  cooked  vegetable  soup  in  a  big  tin  kettle  each 
Tuesday,  and  drank  it  cold  for  the  rest  of  the  week, 
until  the  kettle  was  empty. 

He  knew  what  was  great  and  beautiful  in  art,  let- 
ters and  life.  To  him  Jesus  was  the  greatest  of  men, 
and  Rockefeller  the  meanest.  Money  was  as  unreal 
as  people  who  buy  books  according  to  auction  cata- 
logues and  bindings. 

He  died  in  his  Morris  chair  with  a  book  on  his 
knees.  There  he  was  found,  rigid  and  cold,  several 
days  afterwards  by  the  grocer,  who  came  to  dun  him 
for  last  month's  bill,  which  amounted  to  one  dollar 
and  eighty-five  cents. 

Julius  Doerner  had  a  big  heart,  a  fine  mind,  was 
a  Spartan  by  nature,  German  in  sentimentality,  a 
Yankee  in  shrewdness,  a  lover  of  truth,  an  enemy  of 
hypocrisy  and  idleness;  a  friend  of  outcasts. 

He  knew  books  and  men,  and  therefore  could  not 
make  a  success  in  selling  books  to  men. 

Chicagoans  who  met  him  on  the  street  saw  his  long 
hair,  his  alpaca  coat  and  his  straw  hat,  and  called  him 
a-freak;  others  who  had  met  him  thought  him  a  queer 
one;  the  chosen  few  to  whom  he  gave  his  friendship, 
loved  him. 

He  was  five  feet,  eight  inches  tall,  wore  locks  and 
a  beard    that    hadn't    been    touched    by    shears   for 


IN    BOOK    SHOPS  97 


twenty-five  years,  didn't  give  a  damn  for  conventions 
and  appearances,  lived  his  own  life,  subservient  to  no 
one,  lording  over  no  one. 

The  world  thought  him  poor.     He  was  rich. 

Requiescat  in  pace! 

Kroch's  International  Book  Store  on  Michigan 
Boulevard  is  to  the  West  what  Brentano's  is  to  the 
East.  Shopkeepers  have  become  teachers  and  pub- 
licity agents.  Their  clients  don't  know  what  they 
wish  to  purchase.  They  are  too  tired  or  too  ignorant 
to  read  literary  reviews.  They  let  Mr.  Kroch  tell  them 
what  to  read. 

Mr.  Kroch  is  an  interesting  little  man.  He  wears 
a  toupee  and  a  broad  kindly  smile.  He  has  the  de- 
meanor of  a  man  who  has  risen  from  the  ranks  and 
is  proud  of  it.  He  has  kept  pace  with  his  success. 
Money  has  not  turned  his  head.  He  knows  that  he 
owes  gratitude  to,  the  authors  whom  he  sells.  The 
quainter  his  find,  the  more  exclusive  seems  his  taste, 
the  more  he  pleases  his  clients,  the  greater  will  be  his 
cash  receipts.  And  so  he  has  an  open  eye  for  authors 
who  are  not  popular. 

What  greater  boast  for  a  book  salesman  in  Chicago 
than  to  have  disposed  of  more  than  two  hundred 
copies  of  Oscar  Wilde's  Life  and  Confessions  by 
Frank  Harris?  To  have  induced  more  than  one  hun- 
dred people  to  buy  each  month  Pearson's  Magazine? 
And  his  clients  are  the  very  rich;  he  doesn't  tir€ 
showing  them  the  other  side  of  life. 

Frank  Morris  is  still  on  deck,  issuing  catalogues, 
selling  rare  books,  delighting  his  many  friends  and 
clients  with  the  charm  of  his  personality.  The  man 
with  a  literary  past  is  a  most  amiable  companion,  pre- 
suming that  his  heart  is  filled  with  love,  and  that  his 
compassion  overlooks  the  faults  of  men.  Frank 
Morris  played  an  important  part,  if  not  a  central  one, 
in  that  lurid  period  of  the  early  nineties,  when  Chi- 
cago was  the  literary  Mecca  of  America. 

Powner's  Book  Store  is  the  gathering  place  of  book 
hunters  and  collectors. 


98  ADVENTURES 


"Gems  can  be  found  here,"  seems  the  unwritten 
motto  that  attracts  antiquarians,  as  a  lighted  candle 
attract  moths.  Young  Mr.  Powner  is  in  the  Service, 
somewhere-in-France.  Mr.  Powner,  Sr.,  had  to  leave 
once  more  his  ranch  in  Arizona,  and  assume  the  re- 
sponsibilities of  a  Chicago  shopkeeper. 

And  then  there  is  Janski,  the  old  assistant  of  Frank 
Morris  in  his  late  Adams  Street  shop,  established  in 
a  store  of  his  own,  selling  books  as  ever,  happy  and 
contented  to  contribute  his  part  toward  the  elevation 
of  Chicago's  literary  taste. 

On  Van  Buren  Street,  near  the  Boulevard,  is  also 
a  new  and  important  book  store.  Mr.  Chandler,  for 
more  than  thirty  years  of  McClurge's  Publishing 
house,  has  set  up  up  his  establishment  there.  Very  few 
books  are  in  his  place,  but  each  is  a  jewel.  He  is  a  sort 
of  a  George  D.  Smith  of  Chicago,  but  minus  gambling 
inclinations.  Books  for  him  are  not  objects  for  specu- 
lation, but  gilt-edged  values. 

And,  of  course,  I  paid  a  visit  to  my  friend,  George 
Engelke.  He  is  a  great  occultist,  who  has  not  eaten 
meat  for  thirty  years.  He  believes  in  the  powers  of 
Hanish  of  lamented  memory  and  is  a  sincere  follower 
of  his  cult.  Engelke  is  like  Alfred  Stieglitz  of  291 
Fifth  Avenue,  N.  Y.  His  soul  seems  to  walk  three 
steps  ahead  of  his  body,  or  three  steps  behind  his 
body.  His  life  is  an  eternally  undecided  race,  be- 
tween soul  and  body. 

The  Radical  Book  Shop  is  right  around  the  corner. 
It  is  a  co-operative  store  with  a  large  stock  of  ultra- 
radical pamphlets  and  magazines,  the  meeting  place 
for  all  sorts  of  Bolsheviki,  pleasant  Bolsheviki,  who 
want  to  intoxicate  themselves  with  words  rather  than 
with  deeds,  who  are  more  eager  to  have  a  good  time 
under  present  conditions  than  to  be  martyrs  for  a 
new  and  better  world.  And  when  they  want  to  amuse 
themselves,  and  be  real  radicals,  they  go  around  the 
block,  to  the  Dillpickle.  Mr.  Johns,  who  is  one  of  the 
co-operatives  of  the  bookshop,  is  also  one  of  the  pro- 
prietors of  the  Dillpickle,  a  sort  of  restaurant,  public 
forum,  dance  hall,  and  at  present  "the  slum  of  Chi- 


IN    BOOKSHOPS  99 


cago,"  because  some  of  its  hangers-on  were  arrested 
as  supposed  bomb  manufacturers  during  the  recent 
I.  W.  W.  trial. 

It  is  a  sort  of  debating  club,  a  la  Greenwich  Vil- 
lage, with  automobiles  in  front  of  it  after  ten  p.  m. 
when  the  rich  come  to  see  the  poor,  the  law-abiding 
want  to  have  a  peek  at  the  lawless,  the  properly 
married  to  see  the  free-lovers.  .  .  .  Chicago  is  very 
young,  you  know!  It  is  in  its  bootees.  All  these 
"new  ideas"  are  here  in  flower  of  springtime. 

I  once  said,  "Were  there  no  Greenwich  Village,  one 
would  have  to  be  invented."  Chicaga  invented  its 
own.  The  Dillpickle  will  have  many  competitors 
soon,  under  the  signs  of  flowers,  vegetables  and 
animals.  In  a  couple  of  years  they  will  become  stale 
canned  goods.  And  then  the  empty  cans  will  be  con- 
signed to  the  ash  can.  Greenwich  Village  all  over 
again ! 

1919 


100  ADVENTURES 


In  Boston 

BOOK  stores  are  the  intellectual  barometers  of  our 
cities.  Show  me  where  people  buy  their  books 
and  I  will  tell  you  what  sort  of  life  they  lead. 
Book  stores  always  were  and  are  mirrors  of  the  habits 
and  intellectual  preferences  of  men  and  women. 

The  private  library  has  ceased  to  be  the  pride  of  the 
home.  Homes  have  given  way  to  apartments  and  flats 
with  only  little  space  to  spare  for  book  shelves.  The 
garage  has  taken  the  place  of  the  library.  We  see  our 
friends  in  hotels  and  clubs,  we  spend  our  evenings  only 
rarely  at  home.  Our  Age  of  Electricity  and  rapid  trans- 
portation facilities  does  not  permit  us  to  acquire  the 
placid  habits  of  book  collectors  and  of  book  lovers.  Sure 
enough  we  read  books,  because  we  want  to  know  what 
their  authors  have  to  say.  But  the  author  remains  a 
stranger  to  us,  the  book  once  read  is  done  with  forever. 
We  speak  about  automobiles,  we  look  forward  to  owning 
a  machine,  we  are  building  garages  with  the  same  enthu- 
siasm that  our  fathers  used  to  expend  on  their  libraries 
and  their  books. 

New  York  is  different.  But  New  York  is  not  an  Amer- 
ican city.  It's  so  near  to  Europe  and  its  population  so 
distinctly  foreign  that  the  change  of  the  last  50  years 
is  hardly  noticeable  yet  in  its  book  shops.  Detroit,  the 
old  French  settlement,  which  only  ten  years  ago  was  a 
tenth  of  its  present  size,  has  no  second-hand  book  shops 
at  all.  The  Detroit  book  dealers  mete  out  light  summer 
fiction  which  fits  into  people's  lunch  baskets  in  the  sum- 
mer and  sentimental  Christmas  carols  in  the  winter. 
Technical  books,  automobile  literature  are  their  special- 
ties. This  is  only  natural.  Ninety  per  cent  of  the  people 
are  building  motor  cars  in  order  to  make  a  living;  they 
are  the  buyers  of  the  technical  books.  The  minority  live 
in  order  to  buy  cars  and  make  motor  trips,  and  therefore 
they  need  light  fiction. 

The  character  of  Albany  is  most  truthfully  portrayed 
in  its  book  stores.    Our  legislators  have  so  much  time  on 


INBOOKSHOPS  101 


their  hands  that  they  actually  read  historical  books,  books 
about  Dutch  New  York,  about  the  Wars  of  the  Revolu- 
tion, law  books,  old  state  records.  It  is  considered  good 
form  to  collect  a  historical  library  after  being  elected  to 
office  and  residing  in  Albany.  But  curiously  enough  in 
these  same  serious  book  stores  loads  of  that  sort  of  fiction 
can  be  found  which  smuthounds  of  the  Vice  Society 
are  eternally  trying  to  banish  from  earth.  Phila- 
delphia, of  course,  specializes  in  Quaker  literature; 
Buffalo,  infected  by  the  spirit  of  near  East  Aurora, 
is  swamped  with  the  things  Elbert  Hubbard  used 
to  love.  Chicago  discloses  the  peculiar  love  for  art, 
literature  and  philosophy  that  its  great  percentage  of 
German  workmen  brought  over  from  their  fatherland 
and  left  as  inheritance  to  the  second  and  third  genera- 
tion. It  is  almost  incredible,  yet  true,  that  laborers,  com- 
ing home  from  work  in  the  stock  yards,  stop  at  the  book 
stalls  and  buy  an  add  volume  of  Kant,  or  Heines'  "Bal- 
lads and  Poems."  Chicago  always  had  the  finest  German 
books  in  the  country,  most  likely "  brought  over  by  the 
immigrants. 

San  Francisco  has  a  touch  of  the  East.  Books  on 
mysticism  have  the  honor  place.  Curious  books  of 
all  kinds  are  bought  eagerly.  Indeed,  the  book  stores 
here  tell  you  the  story  of  California's  strange  cults,  of 
its  mystics,  its  prophets  and  its  thousands  and  one  seek- 
ers after  the  hidden  truths  of  the  universe. 

The  last  ten  years  have  wrought  an  astonishing  change 
in  the  book  stores  all  over  the  country,  but  nowhere  a 
sadder  and  more  lamentable  one  than  in  Boston,  Mass. 

Old  CornliiU 

This  oldest  street  of  Boston,  the  Cheapside  of  New 
England,  once  an  important  center  of  city  trade,  gave 
Boston  its  literary  charm.  In  the  dilapidated  old-time 
queer  buildings,  half  a  dozen  book  stores  invited  the 
lovers  of  literature.  Here  was  the  favorite  haunt  of 
the  men  who  gave  Boston  a  literary  reputation.  It 
was  here  in  Cornhill  that  Thomas  Burnham  founded 
the  first  second-hand  book  shop  in  the  United  States  in 
1825.     Young  Burnham  went  from  here  day  after  day, 


102  ADVENTURES 


with  a  basket  of  books  on  his  arm,  to  the  wharves  to 
trade  with  sea-faring  people.  Almost  one  hundred  years 
have  elapsed  and  the  shop  is  still  there.  Oliver  Wendell 
Holmes  had  his  chair  and  desk  in  "The  Old  Corner  Book 
Shop,"  and  in  Colesworthy's  was  a  hidden  nook  where 
Whittier  used  to  hide  for  an  hour  or  two,  reading  newly 
arrived  books,  but  only  rarely  buying.  "Little field's"  was 
next  door,  where  Lowell,  Longfellow  and  Emerson  used 
to  congregate,  talk  and  occasionally  buy  additions  to  their 
libraries. 

But  alas !  Boston  is  no  more  the  Athens  of  America. 
The  book  stores  on  Cornhill  have  shrunk  to  the  num- 
ber of  four.  New  buildings  have  invited  modern  busi- 
ness to  invade  the  neighborhood.  The  remaining  book 
dealers,  still  following  the  traditions  of  half  a  century, 
are  very  old  men.  Their  days  are  counted  and  soon  Corn- 
hill  will  be  remembered  as  one  of  the  landmarks  that 
have  been  swept  away  by  the  modern  spirit  and  are 
gone  forever. 

Burnham's  Antique  Book  Store 

Richard  C.  Lichtenstein,  fifty-five  years  ago  an  appren- 
tice to  old  Mr.  Burnham,  is  now  the  proprietor  of  the 
shop.  He  has  many  memories  of  great  book  days  in 
Boston. 

"The  most  interesting  of  all  my  'finds'  since  I  entered 
the  second-hand  book  trade  in  the  late  sixties,"  he  said 
(he's  a  good  and  entertaining  talker),  "was  the  copy  of 
Poe's  'Tamerlaine,'  which  created  a  great  sensation  among 
collectors.  This  small  pamphlet  of  forty  pages,  published 
l)y  Collin  F.  Thomas  in  Boston  in  1827,  had  escaped  the 
searches  of  the  keenest  of  book  collectors.  I  usually 
soent  my  noon  hour  in  other  second-hand  stores,  and 
one  day  I  found  this  small  pamphlet  which  I  purchased 
for  25  cents.  I  had  a  good  many  opportunities  to  dispose 
of  it,  but  didn't  sell  it  before  1892,  in  auction.  It  was 
knocked  down  to  Dodd,  Meade  &  Co.  for  $1,850.  'Tamer- 
laine' has  remained  unique  among  all  the  books,  being 
today  the  most  costly  American  book  known.  I  under- 
stand a  New  York  bookseller  is  holding  a  copy  at  $15,- 
000. 


INBOOKSHOPS  103 


'"One  day,  I  was  offered  a  small  volume  which  lacked 
the  title  and  two  leaves.  There  was  nothing  specially 
attractive  about  the  book,  but  the  same  intuition  for 
which  I  never  could  account  and  that  guided  me  through 
my  whole  life  as  a  bookseller,  urged  me-  to  offer  the 
owner  $2.00,  which  was  readily  accepted.  Later,  I  found 
out  that  the  book  was  a  copy  of  the  Bay  Psalm  Book, 
the  first  book  printed  in  New  England,  Cambridge,  1640. 
Bishop  Hurst  bought  the  book  for  $1,000,  and  after  his 
death,  it  fetched  $2,500  in  the  auction  of  his  library. 
But  I  have  also  met  with  great  disappointments.  The 
greatest  one  was  on  a  visit  to  an  old  Boston  family  resid- 
ing on  Beacon  Hill.  An  elderly  lady,  the  only  surviving 
member  of  this  family,  wished  to  dispose  of  her  library, 
and  I  found  her  seated  between  two  piles  of  books  busily 
engaged  in  tearing  out  the  fly  leaves  wherever  they  con- 
tained any  inscriptions.  Nothing  could  induce  her  to  stop 
this  barbaric  atrocity.  I  begged  of  her  to  let  me  examine 
the  fly  leaves  and  titles  before  she  threw  them  in  the 
open  grate.  I  saw  to  my  grief,  John  Hancock's  inscrip- 
tions, and  George  Washington's  presentation  to  some 
lady  contemporary,  revolutionary  persons  of  the  first  im- 
portance. Another  opportunity  I  missed  was  years  ago 
when  Mr.  James  J.  Blaine  happened  to  drop  in  our  shop, 
se'ecting  a  copy  of  Count  Grammont's  "Memoirs,"  asking 
to  have  the  volume  laid  aside  for  him.  He  wrote  his 
name  on  the  title  page  and  was  to  call  and  pay  for  it 
on  his  return  to  the  hotel.  The  incident  must  have 
slipped  his  memory,  for  he  never  returned  for  the  book, 
and  I  was  foolish  enough  to  erase  his  signature  from  the 
fly  leaf.  Especially  in  our  days,  where  "Association 
books"  were  so  very  much  in  demand,  Blaine's  name  in 
the  "Memoirs"  would  have  been  a  sought  after  curiosity." 

Lauriat's 

A  sort  of  Brentano's  in  Boston.  The  gathering  place 
of  society,  of  students  and  of  scholars.  They  carry  every- 
thing from  the  rarest  book  to  some  new  Parisian  maga- 
zine, whose  first  number  appeared  four  weeks  ago.  Mr. 
Weber,  the  head  of  the  firm,  looks  like  Napoleon  HI, 


104  ADVENTURES 


and  has  the  most  splendid  contempt  for  everything  new 
in  book  lore.  Mr.  Braithwaite  was  in  his  shop  during 
my  visit  and  it  was  astonishing  to  hear  the  anthologist 
of  six  volumes  of  new  poetry  talking  a  sensible  every- 
day language. 

A  New  and  Evil  Spirit 

Boylston  street  faces  the  big  park,  is  a  lively  prom- 
enade, a  good  deal  of  shopping  is  done  in  its  neighbor- 
hood, a  street  always  densely  populated.  The  Garden 
Side  Book  Shop  hung  out  its  shingle  here,  which  con- 
sists of  a  huge  garden  gate. 

Women  have  a  good  deal  to  do  in  public  life  in  Boston, 
and  women  are  determined  to  be  the  intellectual  guides 
of  Boston  book  buyers,  at  least  of  such  as  wish  to  be 
"modern"  and  "up-to-date."  The  Garden  Side  Book 
Shop  is  conducted  by  women  exclusively.  I  dare  say 
women  must  also  be  the  chief  buyers.  The  most  mar- 
velous and  costly  bindings  on  rows  and  rows  of  shelves. 
Books  of  poetry,  novels,  anthologies  that  were  never 
heard  of  and  what  is  still  worse,  will  never  be  heard  of, 
are  beautifully  dressed  like  brainless  women,  who  wear 
gowns  of  Worth  or  Lady  Duff-Gordon.  Mrs.  Bertha 
Beckford,  one  of  the  proprietors,  approached  me  with 
the  charm  of  the  reception  lady  in  a  fashionable  hair- 
dressing  establishment,  and  invited  me  to  inspect  "some 
darling  little  books,  the  sweetest  ever,  just  arrived  from 
Paris."  I  followed  her  to  a  little  salon  done  in  pink  and 
canary  and  viewed  little  miniature  books,  bound  in  French 
crepe,  a  wallpaper  effect.  There  were  French  anthologies 
of  bits  of  poetry  and  of  war  sentiment.  Dowagers,  with 
grown-up  granddaughters,  and  studded  lorgnettes  went 
into  fits  of  ecstacy  over  the  "darling  books,"  and  I 
shouldn't  be  surprised  if  they  bought  some  and  took 
them  "as  much  appreciated  gifts"  to  some  home  for  con- 
valescent soldiers  and  sailors. 

Book  Shops   for  Boys  and  Girls 

"Splendid,"  I  thought,  seeing  the  sign  next  door.  The 
shop  where  boys  and  girls  can  come  and  choose  their 


INBOOKSHOPS  105 


reading.  It's  located  on  the  fourth  floor  of  the  Women's 
Educational  and  Industrial  Union.  It  looks  like  a  pharm- 
acy. There  wasn't  a  boy  or  girl  in  sight.  A  few  old 
ladies,  who  must  have  left  the  sewing  circle  on  the  third 
floor,  were  sitting  about,  reading.  I  looked  around  the 
shelves  and  I  wondered  if  all  the  Boston  boys  and  girls 
lack  red  blood  and  the  gift  of  fancy  and  actually  read 
the  books  I  saw.  Miss  Alma  Howard,  one  of  the  dis- 
pensers of  this  shop,  told  me  that  all  books  are  being 
carefully  censored  and  selected  by  one  Bertha  E.  Ma- 
honey,  the  director  of  the  Book  Shop  of  the  Union. 
Bertha  seemed  to  be  the  ruling  spirit.  She  has  forbidden 
such  and  such  books,  she  has  placed  others  on  the  black- 
list, but  she  also  selected  books  that  ought  to  be  read 
by  boys  and  girls.  I  asked  what  literary  qualifications 
Miss  Mahoney  had  to  qualify  her  for  the  censoring.  All 
I  could  gather  was  the  fact  that  Miss  Mahoney  is  Miss 
Mahoney,  a  whilom  superintendent  of  the  food  shops  of 
the  union  on  the  floor  below.  Needless  to  say,  the  union 
is  a  highly  aristocratic  place,  frequented  exclusively  by 
the  flower  of  Boston's  ultra  fashionables.  Why  doesn't 
someone  start  a  real  book  store  for  boys  and  girls? 
Accessible  to  everyone,  where  second-hand  books  could 
be  had  for  ten  cents  or  a  quarter? 

Every  other  old  building  in  Boston,  and  many  churches 
bear  honor  tablets,  telling  us  that  here  assembled  revo- 
lutionists of  1776.  The  Boston  of  today,  with  all  its 
laws  of  restriction  and  of  censorship,  is  proud  of  its 
ancient  rebels.  How  paradoxical !  In  talking  about  laws, 
a  new  one  has  just  been  enacted.  The  police  apply  to 
the  sale  of  second-hand  books  the  same  rule  as  to  the 
sale  and  buying  of  second-hand  clothing.  A  dealer,  pur- 
chasing books  from  anyone,  has  to  report  the  purchase 
to  the  police,  describe  the  article  purchased  and  has  to 
wait  thirty  days  before  he  can  sell  it.  The  law  requires 
that  each  book  dealer  must  pay  five  dollars  for  a 
license.  A  similar  law  had  been  enacted  60  years  ago, 
as  a  civil  war  protective  measure.  Oh,  Athens  of 
America !  Selling  books  with  a  second-hand  clothes 
dealer's  license! 


106  '  ADVENTURES 


Books  in  Ice  Box 

Opposite  the  Copley-Plaza,  in  a  fashionable  little  build- 
ing of  its  own,  is  the  Dorado  of  America's  rejected  poets 
and  poetesses,  essayists,  novelists,  free  verse  artists  and 
of  everybody  else  Amy  Lowell  and  Ezra  Pound  would 
press  to  their  bosom.  Here  is  the  book  shop  of  the  Four 
Seas  Publishing  Company,  and  never  was  there  a  greater 
collection  of  literary  atocrities  in  one  room  than  in  this 
p.iry,  inviting  "Hal!  of  Fame."  The  soul  of  Amy  Lowell 
greets  one  uncannily  articulate  from  the  page  of  each 
book. 

A  very  ambitious  clerk  praised  the  authors  of  the 
books  higher  than  genius  has  ever  been  praised  in  Amer- 
ica. "We  have  bought  81  titles  from  the  Badger  Publish- 
ing Company  only  recently  and  have  not  spared  any 
expense  to  print  the  most  attractive  title  and  jackets 
for  this  new  addition  to  our  stock."  Everybody  knows 
the  Badger  books.  The  Badger  Publishing  Company 
gladly  accommodates  authors  of  novels  and  extends  to 
them  the  privileges  of  their  printing  establishment,  pro- 
vided they  are  willing  to  pay  for  publication. 

I  descended  to  the  basement  to  see  the  enormous  stock 
of  books  the  Four  Seas  Company  had  acquired.  The 
store  must  have  been  occupied  by  a  wholesale  florist 
previously,  and  the  most  tremendous  ice  box  I  ever  saw 
in  my  life  filled  the  whole  basement.  The  Badger  books, 
thousands  of  them,  were  neatly  piled  up  in  the  ice  box. 
They  were  in  the  proper  place,  indeed. 

The  Mysterious  Book  Shop 

On  Washington  Street  is  a  very  attractive  book  store, 
conducted  by  a  blind  couple.  }Jan  and  wife  about 
thirty  years  of  age,  both  totally  blind.  The  shop  is 
scrupulously  clean.  If  you  ask  for  a  book,  the  proprie- 
tor will  find  it  in  a  miraculous  way,  provided  it  is  on  the 
shelves.  If  you  are  browsing  about,  picking  up  a  book 
here  or  there,  he  will  ask  you  to  read  off  to  him  the 
title,  and  then  tell  you  the  price.  Both  look  happy,  con- 
tented, and  seem  prosperous. 

I  wondered  how  it  had  happened  that  they  started  in 
the  book  business,  that  both  of  them  were  blind;  had 


INBOOKSHOPS  107 


they  been  blind  before  they  married  or  had  misfortune 
overtaken  them  after  their  marriage?  They're  in  a 
strange  and  mysterious  place,  but  peaceful  and  har- 
monious. 

1918 


108  ADVENTURES 


Small  Town  Stu£F 

WHAT  is  the  mysterious  power  directing  the 
fates  of  small  town  inhabitants?  Who  is  it  who 
sells  them  the  same  style  of  clothes,  induces 
them  to  furnish  their  homes  so  that  they  resemble  one 
the  other  like  one  egg  resembles  another  egg?  Who 
is  it  who  makes  the  people  talk  and  think  alike? 
Never  permitting  an  individual  thought,  or  an  expres- 
sion of  individual  opinion? 

Everything  and  everybody  seem  to  be  cut  after  the 
same  pattern.  Unessentials  are  the  important  things 
in  their  lives,  and  they  miss  the  joy  of  living.  They 
have  not  learned  to  be  their  real  selves.  They  have 
not  been  given  a  chance.  Someone  told  me  once: 
"America  is  a  young  nation.  We  are  about  a  hundred 
years  behind  Europe.  Our  people  have  not  developed 
yet  the  sense  for  beauty  and  art."  It  is  not  so. 
America  of  the  fifties  of  the  last  century  knew  the 
best  in  life,  letters  and  art.  But  with  the  first  great 
fortunes  made  during  the  early  railroad  boom  some 
mysterious  powers  perverted  the  minds  of  America 
systematically;  created  in  them  the  lust  for  sensation, 
for  things  of  the  minute.  And  today  people  are  being 
fed  with  theatres  and  newspapers  and  libraries  and 
music  and  styles,  that  they  really  do  not  want. 

They  are  not  given  a  chance.  They  must  take  what 
these  mysterious  powers  somewhere  on  Wall  Street 
think  good  for  them,  or  they  can  stay  at  home,  lose 
prestige  among  their  fellow-townsmen,  suffer  in  busi- 
ness and  be  decried  ultimately  as  "bolsheviks,"  or 
"reds." 

A  few  weeks  in  Milwaukee  or  any  other  town  of  its 
size  will  open  your  eyes.  Milwaukee  has  grown  in- 
credibly since  1914,  produced  several  hundreds  of  war- 
millionaires  and  has  the  aspects  of  a  most  thriving, 
prosperous  city. 

The  people  crave  for  good  entertainment,  good 
reading,  a  glimpse  of  art.  There  is  an  Art  Institute 
heavily  subsidized  by  the  city.    Its  permanent  exhibi- 


INBOOKSHOPS  109 


tion  is  not  worth  while  talking  of.  Any  third-rate 
dealer  in  New  York  can  produce  such  masterpieces 
from  his  stockroom.  They  are  hung  on  the  staircases 
and  kept  in  boxes  in  the  cellar  of  this  Art  Institute. 
The  traveling  exhibitions  are  displayed  on  walls  that 
need  cleaning.  There  is  not  the  atmosphere  of  appre- 
ciation in  this  building.  The  main  space  is  occupied 
by  a  sort  of  "rummage  exhibit"  consisting  of  all  sorts 
of  souvenirs  lent  by  Milwaukeans,  who  became  mem- 
bers of  the  Institute.  Articles  that  can  be  purchased 
often  in  ten-cent  stores  are  here  on  exhibition  with  a 
card  of  the  proprietor. 

The  Layton  Gallery,  next  door,  is  a  noble  opposite 
to  the  Art  Institute.  Bequeathed  to  the  city  by  the 
late  Layton,  millionaire  packer,  his  hobby  during  his 
lifetime,  it  is  a  real  temple  of  art.  In  an  imposing 
purely  Greek  structure,  wonderful  masterpieces,  col- 
lected from  all  over  the  globe,  almost  every  known 
name  well  represented.  Its  curator,  Mr.  George  Raab, 
an  artist  of  fame  himself,  has  never  permitted  com- 
mercialism or  provincial  small  tradesman  ambition  to 
enter  into  his  sanctuary.  Mr.  Raab,  who  himself 
selected  the  greater  part  of  the  collection,  has  the  rare 
sense  of  the  antiquarian.  His  lectures  have  aroused  a 
good  deal  of  comment  and,  incidentally,  interest  for 
his  gallery.  He  wishes  to  make  the  artist  live  again 
in  his  work.  He  has  given  up  hope  to  convert  the 
present  generation.  His  hope  is  the  coming  genera- 
tion. In  children  and  students  he  tries  to  arouse  a 
love  of  beauty  and  sense  of  harmony  and  color. 

There  is  only  one  bookstore  in  the  real  sense  of  the 
word  in  Milwaukee,  Des  Forges'.  Its  owner  is  a 
bookman  of  the  old  type,  knows  values  and  authors, 
has  studied  his  profession  in  England  and  France  and 
caters  to  the  collectors  and  lovers  of  the  printed  word. 

"The  young  people  don't  care  for  books,"  he  told 
me.  "They  do  not  wish  to  accumulate  libraries.  The 
women-folk  come  in  and  ask  for  'something  nice  to 
read,'  and  take  my  word  for  it.  And  on  occasion  they 
buy  nicely  bound  books  for  gift  purposes."  Again 
here,  the  mysterious  powers  behind  the  throne.     The 


no  ADVENTURES 


books  that  are  featured  in  movie  theatres,  in  install- 
ment novels,  and  in  daily  papers  are  the  best  sellers. 

The  New  Era  Shop,  that  had  recently  unpleasant 
introductions  to  the  police  department,  endeavors  to 
sell  radical  literature  only.  Its  proprietors  are  young 
and  therefore  hopeful.  They  may  gain,  in  the  course 
of  years,  knowledge  of  books  and  then  select  the  right 
sort  of  stock.  It  is  not  radical  to  lend  out  George 
Moore's  "A  Story  Teller's  Holyday"  for  $5  for  a 
reading,  because  .  .  .  well  radical  does  not  mean 
immoral  or  lascivious.  The  New  Era  Shop  could  in- 
augurate a  new  Era  for  Milwaukee  book  readers  if  its 
proprietors  would  inform  themselves  about  the  sort  of 
books  worth  while  introducing  to  the  public.  But 
even  to  this  shop  thanks  are  due.  It  may  lead  to 
something  bigger  and  better. 

The  department  stores  advertise  their  book  depart- 
ments extensively.  Here  is  the  great  hunting  ground 
for  the  Chambers  and  Chesters  and  Nick  Carters  and 
psalm  and  hymn  books.  Rosaries  are  also  carried  in 
these  book  departments. 

The  public  is  not  given  a  chance.  David  Graham 
Philips  and  Susan  Lenox  have  just  reached  Milwaukee 
and  everybody  is  excitedly  discussing  the  fall  and  rise 
of  Susan.  Several  societies  for  the  uplift  of  poor 
working  girls  have  been  organized  as  the  direct  result 
of  the  book. 

The  theatre  buildings  are  magnificent.  Modern, 
airy  buildings  with  comfortable  seats  and  all  new  im- 
provements that  make  the  sojourn  in  a  showhouse 
delightful.  But  the  moving  pictures  shown  are  again 
on  the  level  of  newspaper  fiction  stories,  of  church 
sermons  and  of  best-selling  novels.  The  millionaire, 
v;ho  is  a  villain  and  becomes  an  honest  working  man, 
the  poor  woman  who  marries  a  millionaire,  despite  his 
upstart  mother's  protests,  the  cowboy  who  "cleans 
up"  a  mining  camp  and  kills  a  dozen  rowdies  in  order 
to  sink  exhausted  in  the  arms  of  his  boyhood  sweet- 
heart whom  he  had  deserted  years  ago  .  .  .  and 
men,  women  and  children  sit  through  all  this. 

To    have    dinners    by    the    light    of    orange -colored 


INBOOKSHOPS  111 


candles  while  sitting  on  the  floor  or  on  the  pillows 
gracefully  grouped  about  an  anaemic  poet,  who  reads 
ephemeral  languid  stanzas,  belongs  to  the  good  taste 
required  in  the  best  circles  of  Milwaukee. 

Smocks  and  bobbed  hair  have  just  made  their  ap- 
pearance, and  an  Art  Magazine  will  soon  add  the 
final  touches  of  estheticism. 

Small  gift  shops  have  been  opened  by  enterprising 
dealers  from  Chicago,  and  there  will  be  food  for 
amusement  for  years  in  Milwaukee. 

But  who  will  come  to  this  one  and  to  hundreds  of 
other  towns  and  give  these  good  helpless  people  what 
they  want? 

Good  books,  good  plays,  good  movies  and  a  chance 
to  express  their  individualities  in  a  healthy,  pleasant 
way? 


1919 


112  ADVENTURES 


New  York  Book  Magnates 

4 1  T  F  I  were  rich,"  said  a  well-to-do  broker  to  me 
A.  recently,  "I'd  spend  a  few  hours  every  day  in 
one  of  those  book  dens  on  Fifth  Avenue.  Their 
proprietors  are  delightful  people;  the  surroundings  are 
as  comfortable  as  a  club  library.  Only  it  is  so  inti- 
mate there,  and  they  always  seem  to  have  the  very 
things  that  one  wants — and  they  are  so  darned  ex- 
pensive. They  seem  to  be  in  touch  with  the  whole 
world,  and  the  mere  fact  that  they  always  have  new 
things  whenever  I  drop  in  is  sufficient  proof  that  the 
genus  of  book-worms  is  not  on  the  dying-out  list^  and 
that  people  buy  costly  books  even  in  our  times  of  so 
many  other  lures." 

Of  course,  there  are  book  buyers  today  who  expend 
thousands  and  thousands  of  dollars  for  rare  books, 
but  whom  we  would  not  class  with  the  enthusiastic 
broker  who  wished  to  be  rich  in  order  to  be  able  to 
follow  his  hobby.  Rich  men  often  buy  their  books  as 
investments.  They  have  their  brokers  who  attend 
auctions  for  them,  and  one  day  we  read  that  Mr.  So- 
and-So  bought  such-and-such  a  book  for  a  staggering 
sum  of  money,  and  six  months  later  we  receive  a 
catalogue  from  an  auction  house  telling  us  that  the 
very  same  "book  lover"  will  dispose  of  "duplicates" 
from  his  library  at  auction.  And,  lo!  we  find  the  very* 
same  much-advertised  rare  book  in  this  catalogue.  If 
we  compare  the  price  he  receives  with  the  price  he 
paid  several  months  ago,  we  will  invariably  under- 
stand why  a  stock  gambler  was  induced  to  become  a 
book-lover. 

But,  as  I  said,  we  still  have  antiquarians  of  the  old 
school  with  us,  and  we  also  have  book-sellers  who 
have  preserved  Ben  Johnson's  spirit  in  the  book  deal- 
ers' guild. 

Gabriel  Wells 

It  is  not  so  very  long  ago  that  Mr.  Wells  did  not 
occupy  his  palatial  suite  on  Fifth  Avenue,  and  the  en- 
thusiasm he   then   had   for  his   books   and   for   their 


IN     BOOK     SHOPS  113 


authors  is  his  today.  Fine  sets  of  well-known  authors 
and  also  of  the  minor  lights,  are  his  specialties.  Print- 
ed on  beautiful  papers,  wonderfully  bound,  marvelous- 
ly  extra-illustrated,  inscribed  by  their  authors,  they 
are  there  on  his  shelves.  They  seem  alive,  they  seem 
to  talk  to  you,  they  seem  to  smile  to  you  a  welcome — 
if  Mr.  Wells  feels  you  a  friend,  a  brother  lover  of 
books.  The  whole  world  knows  about  Mr.  Wells' 
beautiful  sets  of  books,  and  whoever  wants  a  rare, 
unusual  edition  comes  to  Mr.  Wells,  or  writes  to  him, 
or  wires  to  him,  or  cables  to  him,  dealers  as  well  as 
private  buyers.  And  if  he  has  time,  he  may  ask  you 
to  view  the  original  manuscript  of  Robert  Louis  Stev- 
enson's "New  Arabian  Nights,"  or  of  Victor  Hugo's 
"Ninety  Three."  Or  he  will  show  you  a  bundle  of 
letters  written  by  Thomas  Payne,  the  draft  of  a  speech 
in  Lincoln's  own  hand  ...  he  could  fill  a  museum 
with  the  material  wrapped  up  in  his  safe.  And  the 
most  delightful  thing  is  the  free  air  of  hospitality  in 
his  den.  I  don't  know  another  place  where  one  can 
lounge  around  more  comfortably  .  .  .  and  not  to 
forget  his  assistant,  Mr.  Royce,  the  Balzac  enthusiast, 
who  compiled  the  only  Balzac  bibliography  in  exist- 
ence. 

Mr.  Drake 

Opposite  the  library  in  a  white  stucco  house  with  a 
narrow  stairway  and  gothic  arched  windows  is  the 
sanctum  of  Mr.  James  F.  Drake.  He  is  a  jovial  old 
gentleman  who  knows  more  about  the  first  editions  of 
English  and  American  authors  than  any  other  book 
dealer.  It  is  his  pride  to  be  the  first  in  New  York  to 
specialize  in  first  editions,  and  he  is  as  well  known  in 
London  as  on  this  side  of  the  ocean.  First  editions 
inscribed  by  the  authors  line  the  book  cases  along  the 
walls,  and  rare  prints  and  pamphlets  nod  and  invite 
you  behind  their  shining  glass  cases. 

Mitchell  Kennerley 

Some  day  (I  hope  in  the  near  future)  some  one  will 
write  a  true  appreciation  of  Mitchell  Kennerley,  the  great 


114  ADVENTURES 


Pathfinder  in  the  American  publishing  field.  He  has 
done  more  for  us  here  than  any  other  English  book 
dealer  ever  anywhere,  with  the  exception  perhaps  of 
Heineman  in  London.  In  America,  Mitchell  Kennerley 
remains  unique.  Endless  is  the  list  of  English  and 
American  authors  he  introduced  to  his  readers  for  the 
first  time.  We  know,  for  instance,  that  Button's  sold 
in  one  month  the  complete  first  edition  of  Leonard  Mer- 
rick's collected  works,  and  thousands  of  copies  of  his 
books  since.  But  Mitchell  Kennerley  introduced  him  to 
us  twelve  years  ago,  when  no  one  knew  his  name.  Or 
Hergesheimer,  a  best  seller  ever  since  the  Saturday  Eve- 
ning Post  placed  him  among  its  regular  contributors,  but 
Mitchell  Kennerley  published  his  best  seller  of  today 
many  years  ago.  He  gave  us  the  tragic  poets  Middleton 
and  Davidson,  and  no  one  has  printed  them  since.  The 
first  part  of  his  catalogue  is  a  roll  of  honor  of  the  Eng- 
lish nineties.  He  always  kept  a  sharp  eye  for  American 
contemporary  authors,  and  usually  got  the  best  of  the 
work  they  had  done  and,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  ever  will  do. 
There  is  Harry  Kemp,  for  instance.  He  didn't  beat  his 
first  book  yet,  published  by  Kennerley  a  half  dozen  years 
ago.  Horace  Traubel  found  his  life's  dream  material- 
ized when  Mitchell  Kennerley  published  his  diaries  With 
Walt  Whitman  in  Camden.  Not  to  forget  Alexander 
Harvey's  masterful  short  stories.  One  of  them  (The 
Toe)  is  worth  a  whole  bookshelf  of  short  stories.  And 
dear  Michael  Monahan,  whose  charming  books  he  pub- 
lished, whose  magazine.  The  Papyrus,  he  gave  a  tem- 
porary home. 

Mitchell  Kennerley  also  claims  the  honor  of  having 
introduced  Frank  Harris  to  America. 

Possessor  of  60,000  Original  Drawings 

A  new  type  of  bookseller  has  developed  during 
the  last  twentj'-five  years — a  man  who  combines  part 
of  the  knowledge  of  the  antiquarian  of  yore  with 
the  qualities  the  modern  collector  and  book  buyer 
will  request  from  his  agent.  Books  and  literary  prop- 
erty have  become  commercial  values  equal  to  stocks 
which  are  listed  upon  the   stock  exchange;   subject  to 


IN    BOOK    SHOPS  115 


corners  created  by  shrewd  buyers  and  holders,  to  fluctu- 
ations caused  by  selling  en  masse.  The  successful  rare- 
book  dealer  of  today  must  operate  with  his  wares  like  a 
stock  broker.  The  banker  who  starts  his  business  with 
a  limited  capital  and  operates  on  a  legal  interest  basis 
has  very  little  chance  to  become  rich.  But  if  he  succeeds 
in  acquiring  with  his  limited  capital  the  entire  stock  of 
a  mine  which  proves  a  success  after  he  acquired  it  has 
equal  chances  to  make  money  as  the  rare-book  dealer 
who  has  had  the  good  fortune  to  buy  for  a  farthing  the 
entire  literary  property  of  a  man  who  proves  a  celeb- 
rity after  his  death  and  whose  manuscripts  are  worth 
a  hundred  times  their  weight  in  gold. 

Harry  Stone  is  a  book  dealer  of  the  new  type.  He 
acquired  his  knowledge  here  and  there.  The  desire  to 
wander  from  his  earliest  youth  made  him  pass  the  ent- 
rance exam  into  the  university  of  hard  knocks.  He  al- 
ways loved  books.  He  v?as  always  buying  books.  Eager- 
ly he  absorbed  books  on  books,  articles  about  books  and 
authors  and  .  .  .  Auction  Prices  Current.  After  he 
had  acquired  a  collection  of  curious  books  which  would 
fill  the  shelves  of  a  good-sized  store,  he  started  his  shop 
on  Fourth  Avenue,  that  avenue  that  once  led  to  the 
Astor  Library  and  that  was  lined  with  bookshops  on 
both  sides. 

He  not  only  appreciated  the  commercial  value  of 
books,  but  he  read  them.  Especially  those  that  were 
scarce  and  more  valued  than  other  works  by  the  same 
authors.  And  he  learned  to  respect  the  men  who  wrote 
these  books.  His  shop  became  the  gathering-place  of 
literature.  Wrecked  hopes  of  authors  and  publishers 
found  in  Stone's  shop  a  safe  harbor.  He  paid  a  fair 
price  for  everything  of  value  offered  him  and  soon  he 
was  known  as  the  dealer  in  quaint  and  curious  books 
and  pamphlets. 

Good  fortune  knocked  on  his  door.  One  rich  find 
came  after  another.  He  was  able  to  supply  collectors 
and  other  book  dealers  with  long-sought-after  items. 

Recently  he  acquired  the  most  complete  collection 
of  American  drawings  by  magazine  illustrators  that 
was  ever  gathered  under  one  roof.     Sixty  thousand 


116  ADVENTURES 


specimens  of  American  and  foreign  artists  whose 
works  have  appeared  in  American  illustrated  maga- 
zines he  bought  from  the  files  of  leading  publishers. 

In  an  astonishingly  short  time  he  made  himself  ac- 
quainted with  his  new  field.  He  became  a  walking 
encyclopaedia  of  American  illustrators.  He  searched 
libraries  and  other  resources  for  biographical  data  of 
lesser-known  artists  whose  works  are  included  in  his 
collection.  He  studied  the  different  periods  of  art 
development  in  America  and  again  he  made  his  shop 
not  only  the  gathering-place  of  his  customers  but  an 
interesting  meeting-place  of  artists  and  of  connois- 
seurs. 

He  is  very  young — not  thirty  yet — a  bright  young 
fellow  with  a  keen  sense  of  appreciation;  because  he 
knows  that  only  the  good  will  stand  the  proof  of  time 
and  will  last  and  will  eventually  become  a  good  in- 
vestment. He  knows  the  border-line  between  artist 
and  businessman;  he  never  transgresses  into  foreign 
territory,  and  therefore  one  can  call  him  justly  an 
idealist,  at  times — when  he  talks  about  art. 


1919 


INBOOKSHOPS  117 


Snapshots  in  Art  Galleries 
on  Fifth  Avenue 

Daniel's  Gallery 

MR.  HARTPENCE  seems  to  be  the  moving 
spirit  of  Daniel's  Gallery.  He  is  a  poet  and 
close  associate  of  Alfred  (Mushroom)  Kreym- 
borg.  He  is  tenacious,  he  has  convictions  of  his  own 
and  he  is  silent.  "What's  the  use  of  convincing  others? 
It  is  sufficient  labor  to  keep  one's  own  self  con- 
vinced." 

It  is  a  red  letter  day  in  the  Daniel  gallery.  Hart- 
pence  is  behaving  nicely  to  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Davies.  The 
great  master  is  trying  to  give  every  man  a  show.  He 
is  studying  attentively  the  electric  bells,  wires,  flags, 
etc.,  etc.,  picturesquely  stocked  on  the  canvases.  Hart- 
pence  points  timidly  to  a  canvas  apparently  depicting 
five  extensions  of  a  town  pump  done  in  many  colors. 

"This  is  his  wife,"  whispers  Hartpense,  pointing  to 
a  prune-colored  pump  .  .  .  "This  is  his  friend,"  point- 
ing to  an  olive  green  one. 

"There  is  considerable  realism,  I  see,"  sighs  Davies, 
quite  unconscious  of  being  funny.  Mrs.  Davies  is 
murmuring  something  behind  her  catalogue  and  try- 
ing to  live  up  to  her  husband's  reputation. 

Daniel's  Gallery  is  never  complete  without  a  primal 
man  walking  around.  This  man  is  invariably  an  artist 
with  long  hair  and  a  primitive  neck.  The  charming 
shepherd  of  the  hills  is  his  ambition.  Every  modern 
gallery  must  have  long-haired  men  with  big  Adam's 
apples  and  short-haired  women  with  long  necks  and 
pale  faces  standing  around  in  interesting  groups  or 
gazing  at  a  picture  in  a  remote  corner  in  solitary  con- 
finement. 

At  Coady's  Gallop 

The  Coady  family  is  usually  found  sitting  alone  at 
home  with  their  pictures.  The  only  sound  heard  is 
the  grinding  of  mechanical  devices  hanging  in  their 
frames.     No'isms   and   no'ismisms   are    Coady's   spe- 


118  ADVENTURES 


cialties.  Confusion  outside  harmony  inside  are  his 
themes.  He  is  an  excellent  talker.  He  does  it  kindly 
and  patiently  and  seldom  will  he  be  interrupted  by  his 
listeners. 

Stieglitz'  291 

Stieglitz  is  trying  in  vain  to  make  a  carping  friend 
believe  that  the  pictures  on  exhibition  are  a  step  up 
from  Cezanne  or  Matisse.  If  he  doesn't  like  this  one, 
well,  here  is  one  not  so  modern.  Why  shouldn't  he 
like  that.  And  here  is  one  not  so  modern  even  as 
that  one. 

Walkowitz  is  always  there  agreeing — if  he  didn't 
agree  he  wouldn't  be  there. 

Stieglitz  had  had  a  hair  cut  last  week.  Stieglitz 
always  has  a  hair  cut  when  the  cold  winter  winds 
start  to  blow. 

It  is  a  historical  moment  each  year  when  Alfred 
Stieglitz,  "specialist  of  work  of  all  kinds,"  feels  the 
approach  of  the  cold  winter  breezes  and  knows  that 
the  time  has  come  to  have  his  hair  cut  again.  Ha! 
how  it  will  grow  until  next  year,  until  it  has  to  be 
cut  again.  But  the  Fifth  Buddha  isn't  born  yet  and 
Stieglitz's  soul  still  walks  three  steps  ahead  of  its 
body. 
The  Sunwise  Turn  Bookshop 

There  they  are  simply  quiet  and  awfully  Batik. 
Another  art  shop  for  art's  sake  where  the  returns 
more  than  justify  us  in  being  artistic.  "See  this  Batik 
dress,  isn't  it  expressive,  why  won't  people  dress  like 
that  all  the  time?"  Nobody  but  a  Bahaist  or  a  Rosi- 
crucionist  or  a  Greenacre  disciple  would  be  seen  dead 
in  it.  Then  there  are  books,  lots  of  nice  books  by  nice 
people  and  bought  by  nice  people. 

The  room  is  decorated  in  the  scheme  of  a  musical 
chord.  A  rope  would  be  more  appropriate  for  those 
who  are  responsible  for  its  decoration. 

At  Ehrich's  Gallery 

It  is  like  stepping  from  Churchill's  on  Broadway 
into  the  Fifth  Avenue  Cathedral,  if  one  has  spent  the 


INBOOKSHOPS  119 


forenoon  in  the  modern  art  galleries  on  the  Avenue 
and  then  walks  into  Ehrich's.  Here  is  a  good  healthy 
commercial  atmosphere  dealing  in  the  Renaissance. 
Whether  the  lights  are  turned  out  out  of  respect  for 
the  Annunciation  which  holds  the  stage  with  foot- 
lights before  it  or  whether  Mr.  Ehrich  recognizes  that 
where  people  speak  with  more  than  bated  breath  and 
hushed  voices  as  they  do  in  museums,  the  lights  ought 
to  be  lowered,  is  the  question?  Here  you  not  only 
lower  your  voice,  but  you  study  the  art  of  tiptoeing. 
Madonnas,  saints'  pictures,  and  other  pictures  which 
will  be  sainted  by  virtue  of  their  purchase  prices  are 
on  the  walls. 

Please  pass  the  incense  pot. 


1916 


120  ADVENTURES 


'Way  Down  in  Greenwich  Village 

THE  fad  of  false  Bohemia  in  Greenwich  Village 
has  passed.  The  purple  and  orange  brand  of 
tearooms  and  of  so-called  gift  shops  where  art 
lovers  and  artistic  people  from  the  Bronx  and  Flat- 
bush  assembled,  have  gone  out  of  existence.  The 
designers  and  manufacturers  of  astounding  atrocities 
who  called  themselves  "modern  artists"  have  disap- 
peared. True  there  are  a  few  short-haired  women 
left,  who  parade  the  streets  in  their  unusual  clothes, 
but  they,  too,  will  soon  move  to  other  parts  of  the 
city  with  the  return  of  the  soldiers,  and  will  reas- 
sume  their  real  calling  in  life. 

Workers  and  ambitious  strivers  have  taken  posses- 
sion, once  more,  of  the  sacred  grounds,  where  mem- 
ories and  hopes  are  holy  possessions,  where  so  many 
have  worked  and  toiled  and  spread  an  evangel,  now 
accepted  universally. 

New  places  have  sprung  up  where  idlers  find  them- 
selves isolated,  where  enthusiasm  and  sincerity  is 
written  on  walls  and  faces.  And  people  are  doing 
things  once  more  in  Greenwich  Village.  Commer- 
cialism seems  to  have  disappeared,  and  men  are  will- 
ing to  help  men. 

The  Paint  Box 

Mrs.  Williams  has  opened  an  art  gallery,  the  Paint 
Box,  where  anybody  may  exhibit,  anybody  who  wishes 
to  hang  his  or  her  pictures.  Everybody  is  welcome 
to  view  the  exhibits;  who  is  willing  to  pay  an  obolus 
of  ten  cents.  But  it  is  worth  it.  And  Mrs.  Williams 
has  to  pay  rent  and  light.  Her  idea  is  not  new  by 
any  means.  Five  years  ago  I  came  to  Washington 
Square  and  opened  what  was  later  called  Bruno's 
Garret.  "Here  are  my  walls,"  I  said.  "Come  and 
hang  your  pictures,  if  you  are  an  artist.  Here  is  my 
magazine,  voice  in  it  your  opinion  of  any  subject  you 
may  choose,  if  you  are  a  writer.    Here  is  an  auditor- 


INBOOKSHOPS  121 


ium  with  comfortable  chairs;  come  and  recite  your 
poems,  face  your  critics,  if  you  are  a  poet.  .  .  ." 

I  charged  nothing  for  all  of  this,  no  admission  fees, 
no  wall  space  rates.  I  did  not  sell  or  try  to  sell 
anything.  But  I  believe  that  Mrs.  Williams'  plan  is 
better.  The  small  admission  fee  will  not  interfere 
with  the  number  of  visitors,  and  the  altruistic  motive 
therefore  less  evident,  and  more  ready  acceptance  by 
the  people.  Her  galleries  are  spacious,  light,  airy 
rooms  in  No.  44  Washington  Square.  The  walls  are 
hung  with  pictures.  Pictures  everywhere.  Small  and 
large.  In  oil  and  water.  Miniatures  and  life-sized 
paintings;  cubist  and  conventionals;  foreign  and  fa- 
miliar; so  many  pictures  on  each  wall  that  there  is  not 
enough  space  for  the  proverbial  pin  to  glide  through 
and  fall  to  the  floor. 

We  met  old  acquaintances  on  the  walls.  There  was 
Glen  Coleman,  in  our  estimation  the  best  of  the 
younger  artists  in  America.  He  is  painting  in  oil  now. 
My  readers  will  remember  my  frequent  references  to 
Coleman's  pen  and  ink  sketches,  to  his  street  scenes, 
especially  his  sketches  of  Greenwich  Village.  There 
is  so  much  peace  and  life  in  his  work.  His  houses 
tell  stories.  His  old  lantern  lighting  the  corner  of  a 
narrow  street  somewhere  on  the  East  Side  becomes 
familiar  and  we  grow  really  attached  to  it. 

Coleman  has  a  genius  for  depicting  the  eternal  in 
the  fleeting  moments  of  life.  He  seems  far  above  men 
and  things.  His  brush  is  dipped  in  love.  He  is  the 
only  American  artist  who  gives  grandeur  to  the  pov- 
erty of  every  day  life  on  city  streets. 

Stuard  Davis  has  some  of  his  latest  works  there. 
A  cemetery.  I  have  forgotten  where  it  is  situated, 
very  appealing  with  its  crosses  and  stones,  on  a  slop- 
ping hill  bathed  in  sunrays.  This  cemetery  is  per- 
haps unique  in  the  world.  No  remains  of  weary 
travelers  repose  beneath  the  crosses.  They  were 
erected  by  loving  hands,  while  the  loved  one  per- 
ished in  some  strange  land  or  on  the  sea.  And  noth- 
ing but  the  sad  news  of  their  death  has  come  as  a 
last  message  to  friends  and  relatives. 


122  ADVENTURES 


He  has  a  musician  there  whose  nose  is  bleeding. 
We  sympathize  with  the  stricken  musician. 

Bobby  Edwards,  the  singer  of  the  village,  hung  a 
few  ukeleles  and  some  very  eye-fetching  pictures. 

Have  you  ever  heard  of  that  master  of  the  lost  art 
of  wood  engraving,  Gustave  Baumann,  and  his  incom- 
parable scenes  of  cities  from  all  over  the  Union. 
"Gloomy  Gus"  he  was  called  in  the  West,  this  untir- 
ing artist  who  wanders  from  city  to  city  cutting  his 
own  wood  blocks,  printing  them  on  his  old  hand 
press,  always  independent,  always  free,  an  eternal 
traveler.  He  struck  New  York  and  the  Village  and 
left  his  card  in  the  shape  of  a  few  leaves  that  attract 
attention  the  very  minute  we  enter  the  room. 

Howard  Heath's  pictures,  which  remind  so  very 
much  of  the  work  of  Acton  Davies  during  the  cubist 
craze,  are  right  near  Ezra  Winter's  "The  Philos- 
opher." The  Philosopher  is  a  gentleman  commonly 
called  a  bum.  He  is  seated  near  a  beach,  taking  a 
foot-bath  in  the  splashing  waves,  and  staring  medi- 
tatively at  a  tiny  daisy  in  his  grisly,  awkward  hand. 

And  fifty  other  artists  of  whom  the  world  will  hear 
some  day  (or  never)  have  accepted  the  invitation  of 
Elvin  Williams  and  have  joined  her  happy  family  in 
the  Paint  Box.  And  she,  herself?  No,  she  has  not 
short  hair.  She  is  not  an  old  maid,  not  eccentric. 
Nothing  wrong  with  her.  A  charming  young  woman, 
even  dressed  as  any  other  one  above  Fourteenth 
Street.  She  had  an  idea,  she  said.  The  idea  seems 
to  work  out  all  right. 


1919 


INBOOKSHOPS  123 


President  Harding's  Favorite  Book 

PRESIDENT-ELECT  HARDING  was,  and  is,  a 
newspaper  man.  Thank  God  for  that.  He 
knows  life  as  it  is,  and  as  it  appears  to  be  in  the 
press.  The  man  who  knows  how  to  read  our  news- 
papers has  won  half  of  the  battle.  And  newspaper 
men  are  generous  and  excellent  judges  of  men. 

Harding  smokes  cigarettes.  This  puts  him  in  a 
different  class.  Look  out  for  the  man  who  warns  you 
against  cigarettes.  Who  tells  you  (on  offering  him 
your  case)  with  a  superior  smile:  "Thanks,  I  don't  use 
them." 

Sometimes  I  will  sing  a  song  of  hate  against  those 
black  cigars  of  the  sedate  and  of  the  respectable.  I 
loathe  the  cigar  of  the  habitual  smoker,  so  justly 
characterized  by  Schopenhauer  as  a  stimulant  of 
thought  for  people  who  do  not  think.  Not  one  smoker 
of  cigarettes  ever  arrives  at  that  low  level  of  enjoy- 
ment. 

To  smoke  a  cigar  is  not  much  more  than  a  hobby. 
The  cigarette  is  a  passion,  a  vice. 

The  cigarette  is  intoxicating.  If  one  inhales  the 
aromatic  smoke,  draws  it  deep  into  one's  lungs,  into 
blood  and  nerves,  one  feels  that  this  narcotic  wonder- 
poison  liberates  the  soul  from  a  profane  pressure,  and 
one's  spirit  is  lured  to  lighter  and  brighter  regions. 
Intoxication  is  the  sweet  magic  of  the  cigarette,  and, 
therefore,  the  cigarette  is  inseparable  from  all  extrav- 
agant enjoyments.  The  cigarette  is  in  the  gambling 
den.  It  can  be  found  always  where  they  drink  cham- 
pagne. It  is  a  part  of  frivolity,  of  sin,  of  the  poetry 
of  enjoyment.  Its  aromatic  fragrance,  the  tender 
rings  that  vanish  swiftly  into  grotesque  figures  .... 
The  cigarette  is  the  perfume  of  the  boudoir. 

The  cigarette  smoker  never  looks  for  a  stronger 
brand,  as  the  consumer  of  cigars,  who  methodically 
tans  his  tongue  with  his  weed.  The  cigarette  smoker 
increases  his  daily  ration,  and  finally  smokes  between 
the  courses  of  his  meal,  between  his  kisses In 


124  ADVENTURES 


the  green  room  of  theatre  and  concert  room,  you  can 
see  him  hungrily  reaching  for  his  silver  case,  the  gift 
of  his  beloved.  He  awakens  in  the  night  and  lights 
his  cigarette,  and  what  peace  and  joy  after  each  long 
draught  of  the  sweet  redeeming  bewilderment.  That's 
quite  different  from  that  brown,  ill-smelling  butt, 
chewed  from  one  corner  of  the  mouth  to  the  other, 
lighted  again  and  again,  until  it  has  happily  dissolved 
itself  into  ashes.  A  bedroom  filled  with  smoke:  a 
long  story  of  enlightenment  to  the  one  who  knows. 
The  cigarette  fits  in  our  nervous  times.  A  nervous 
pleasure  for  a  nervous  people.  We  smoke  cigarettes 
because  we  are  nervous.  We  are  nervous  because  we 
smoke  cigarettes. 

How  beautiful  they  look,  golden,  tender  threads 
enclosed  in  fragile  rice  paper,  like  a  lovely  woman's 
beautiful  hair,  fragrant  and  tempting.  Compare  them 
with  the  most  beautiful  box  of  cigars.  Those  black, 
strong-smelling  cigars,  carcasses  of  leaves  transformed 
into  mummies.  Think  of  the  men  who  smoke  them, 
and  tell  me  isn't  there  some  similarity? 

In  some  Sunday  paper,  I  read  that  Mr.  Harding's 
favorite  book  was  written  by  Edgar  Saltus.  You  rack 
your  brains?  You  don't  remember  Saltus?  Twenty 
years  ago,  he  was  hailed  as  the  coming  American 
novelist.  At  least  twenty  books  of  his  appeared  in 
short  succession.  Today  he  is  known  almost  exclus- 
ively to  the  booklover.  First  (often  the  only)  editions 
of  some  of  his  books  are  in  demand  and  sell  at  fancy 
prices,  while  others  can  be  found  at  the  book  bargain 
counters  of  Liggett's  Drug  Stores  at  twenty-five  cents 
a  copy.  His  Magdalene  appeared  at  the  time  of 
Oscar  Wilde's  visit  to  America.  Both  men  met  here, 
in  London  and  Paris.  Critics  contend  that  Wilde  re- 
ceived from  this  book  his  inspiration  for  Salome. 
There  are  pages  and  pages  of  great  similarity  in  both 
books.  Saltus'  Magdalene  is  a  fine  contribution  to  the 
world's  literature  of  Magdalenes.  In  all  his  books 
there  is  a  touch  of  the  French  eighties,  and  a  reason- 
ance  with  the  English  nineties.  If  Saltus  had  not 
been  a  scholar,  he  would  be  another  George  Moore. 


INBOOKSHOPS  125 


Only  a  connoiseur  can  take  a  fancy  to  Saltus,  a  man 
who  has  a  fine  sense  for  literature  and  for  life. 

I  love  to  think  of  the  newspaper  man  with  literary 
inclinations  smoking  his  cigarette,  while  reading,  one 
of  Saltus'  books,  in  his  study  in  the  White  House. 


1920 


INDEX 


Adams,  John 75,  85 

Adams,  John  Quincy 76 

American   News   Co 58 

Anderson    Galleries 75 

American  Art   Associa- 
tion  26,  27 

American  Art  News 33 

Ann    Street 39 

A    Kempis,    Thomas 64 

Aster 24 

Astor   Library 39 

Atherton,    Gertrude 50 

Arens,  Eg^mont 52 

Anderson,  Zoe 54 

Adam,  Villiers   de  L'Isle....91 
Albany 109,    111 

Baxterstreet 12...    13 

Boticelli 31 

Beauregarde,    General 34 

Bingham,   Mrs 35 

Beardsley,  Aubrey 43,  91 

Breslow,  Max 44 

Bender,    Frank 44,   45,  46 

Bierce,    Ambrose 51 

Benjamin,  W.  R...71,  72,  73,  74 

Burr,   Aaron 48 

Boumann,  Gustave 122 

Boni,    Brothers 52 

Boni  and  Liveright 53 

Bh-oadway 56 

Bowery 63,  64 

Brunswick  Hotel 71 

Bruno's   Garret 120 

Benjamin,   Park 72 

Buchanan,    James 76 

Brentano 82 

Bethoven 89 

Brown,  Cowley 11 

Baudelaire 91 

Boston 101 

Bufifalo 101 

Burnham,    Thoma 102 

Bay  Psalm  Book 103 

Blaine,  James  J 103 

Braithwaite,   Stan 104 

Beckfort,    Bertha 104 

Badger  Publish.   Co 106 

Balzac 113 

Canina 46 

Cezanne    118 

Chicago 56,  87,  88 


Chicago   Chap    Books 91 

Comstockery 53 

Corot 26,  43 

Clark,  Aug 27 

Coady's    Gallery 118 

Chippendale 33 

Central  Park 39 

Custer,  E.  A 40,  41,  42,  43 

Carnegie  Libraries 83 

Casement,   bookseller 59 

Casement,    Roger,    Sir 59 

Chambers,  Robert 62 

Carter,  Nick 65 

Corbett,  bookseller 67 

Civil  War 72 

Coleman,   Glenn    121 

Collector,   The 73 

Chesterton,  G.  K 75 

Cleveland,  Grover 76 

Crane,  Stephen 81 

Cadigan,    Mr 82 

Clay,    Henry 85 

Caine,    Hall 91 

Chandler,    George 98 

Colesworthy 102 

Cornhill 102 

Clarion    Book   Shop 10 

Daniel's   Gallery.  117 

Darrow,    General 27 

Dana,    Editor 72 

Davies,   Acton 117 

Davis,  Stuart 121 

Davidson,  John 114 

Degas 26 

Dickens 41 

Duke,    Jerome 47 

Dreambooks 60 

Democratic    Revue 79 

Davidson,    John 91 

Dill  Pickle 98 

Dan  Martin  Mission 87 

Duerer,  Albrecht 87,  95 

Doerner  Julius. 87,  88,  89,  90,  95 

Dowson,   Ernest 91 

Detroit 100 

Dodd,  Mead  &  Co 102 

Duff  Gordon,   Lady 104 

Dutton's    114 

Des,    Forges 109 

Drake,  J.   F 113 

Dennen's 10 


East  Side,  The 54 

Eaton    Bill 92 

Edwards,    Bobby 122 

Ehrich's  Gallery 118,  119 

Engelke,    George ^ 

Emerson,  Ralph  W 102 

Fifth  Ave.  Auction  Rooms.. 26 

Platau's   Auction   Rooms 28 

Fulton,    Robert 85 

Field,  Eugene 91,  92,  93 

Four  Seas  Co 106 

Gardenside   Book   Shop 104 

Garvice,    Charles 66 

Goldsmith,  Alfred.  ...49,  50,  51 

Griswold,  Rufus S>7 

Garfield,  James  A 76 

Grant,    Ulyssess 76 

Greenwich 

Village. ..52,  99,  120,  121,  122 

Glebe    Magazine 52 

Gerhardt,   Christian 54 

Gillin,   Jim 69 

Goose  Quill 91 

Goethe 96 

Harding,   Warren   S 123 

Hartman,   Auctioneer 26 

Harte,    Bret 60 

Hartpense,   W 117 

Harvey    Alexander 114 

Holmes,    Sherlock 33 

Heath,    Howard 122 

Harris,   Frank 91,  97,  114 

Haberson,    D.    L 67 

Healy's   Cabaret 68 

Hergesheimer 114 

Hamilton,  Alexander 85 

Hill,    Walter 93 

Hubbard,    Elbert 101 

Heine,   Heinrich 101 

Heineman 114 

Holmes,  Oliver  W 102 

Hurst,   Bishop 103 

Howard,  Alma 105 

Hugo,    Victor 113 

Higgins,    Bookseller 9,    10 

I.  W.  W 99 

James,    Henry 60 

James,   Miss 60 

Jumel,    Mme 48 

Johnson,   Mr 69 


JeflFerson,    Thomas 75 

Janski 98 

Johns,    John 98 

Johnson,   Ben 112 

Kranach,  Master 95 

Kemp,   Harry 114 

Kennerly,    Mitchell.. .  .113,    114 

Kettel's    Theatre 63 

Kirby,  Mr 26 

Kolliskis' 29 

Knoke,  Joe  W 65 

Kant,   Em 101 

King,    Ben 91 

Kirschenbaum's 64 

Kipling,  Rud 73,  91 

Kreymborg,  Alfred 52 

Kimball  &  Stone 91 

Liggett's  Drug  Stores 124 

Madison,  Book  Store 59 

Maria,  Old 54 

Marie  Antoinette 80 

Marshall    Field 22 

Middleton,    Richard 114 

Matisse    118 

Monahan,    Michael 114 

Municipal    Courts 63 

Markham,    Edwin 67 

MacCarthy,  J.  F...32,  33,  34,  35 

Merrick,    Leonard 114 

McKinley,  William... 76,  77,  85 

Mt.   Vernon 35 

Millet 43 

Monroe,  James 76 

Madigan,  Francis  P...78,  79,  80 

Madigan,  Thomas 84,  85,  86 

Moody,  Church 87 

Moore,    George 124 

Mozart 89 

Morris,   Frank 91 

Mallarmee,  Stephen 91 

Mahoney,    Bertha 105 

Milwaukee 108 

MacKee,  Walter 10 

New  York 39,  100 

Nye,  Bill 91 

New  Era  Bbok  Shop 110 

Oxford   Book   Shop 49 

Osgood,  James  R 86 

Old  Corner  Book  Shop 102 


Papyros    114 

Paint    Box 120 

Patter,  Palmer,  Mrs 89 

Parkrow 12 

Philadelphia 37,  101 

Pimple,    Mr 50,   51 

Poe,  Edgar  A 71,  78,  79,  96 

Peledan,  Joseph 91 

Powner's  Book  Shop.  10,  93,  98 

Pearson's  Magazine 97 

Pound,   Ezra 106 

Phillips,   David  Graham 110 

Paine,    Thomas 113 

Proctor,  Arthur 10 

Raab,  George 109 

Radical   Book   Shop 98 

Reliance   Book  Shop 19 

Rubens 22,  31 

Reynolds,    Joshua 54 

Riley,  James 75 

Roosevelt  Theodore,  T?,  85,  10 

Richelieu,    Cardinal 81 

Rosetti,    Gabriel   D 85 

Reed,  Opie 91 

Rockefeller,  J.  D 96 

Royce,  Mr 113 

Saturday  Evening  Post  —  ll4 

Saltus,  Edgar 124 

Salop,  Alexander 60 

Salvation  Army  Book 

Dept 17,  19,  20,  21 

Schopenhauer 123 

Shaw,   Bernard   G 30 

Silo,  Auctioneer.: 27 

Schulte,  Theodore.... 47,  81,  82 

Stone,  Harry 114,  115,  116 

Stiezlitz,  Alfred   118 

Sumnerism 53 

Sunwise    Turn 118 

Stuart,   Gilbert 30,   33 

Sutton,    James 34 

Stammer,  Peter... 47,  60,  69,  70 

Sinclair,   Upton 50 

Schnitzler,   Arthur S3 

Studio   Club 60 

Shakespeare 63 

Street   &   Smith 66 

Shaflfat's 10 

Schwartz,  Osia 69 

Sumner,    Charles 69 

Society   for  Prevention 

of  Vice 69,  101 


San    Francisco 101 

SheUy,   P.    B 71 

Schenectady   Daily   Union... 72 
Southern  Literary  Mes- 
senger  79  • 

Smith,  George  D 79 

Sargent,  John  S 86 

Stieglitz,  Alfred 98 

Stevenson,  Robert  Louis... 113 

Tintoretto 22 

Times,   N.   Y 55 

Traubel,  Horace 44,  114 

Tucker,  Benjamin 60 

Thompson,  John  R 70 

Talley,  Miss 79 

Tiffany's 89 

Taft,  William  Howard... 77,  85 

Taylor,  Bayard 86 

Thomas,  Collin  F 102 

Vanderbilt  Hotel 29 

Van    Southall 51 

Velasquez. 31 

Vogue 62 

Verlaine 91 

Visscher,   Bill,   Col 92 

Walkowitz 118 

Waterloo,  Stanley 91 

Washington,  Martha. 22,  29,  36 
Washington,  George,  33,  75,  85 

Washington    Square 53. 

Washington   Square   Book 

Shop 52 

Whistler,  J.  McN 26,  87 

Wertmueller 34 

Whitman,  Walt.44,  53,  96,  114 

Wiggins,   K.    D 50 

Weyhe,    E 53 

Williams,   Elvin 121,   122 

Wilde,  Oscar.60,  64,  78,  80,  91,  96 

Wells,  H.  W 75 

Wilson,   Woodrow 77,  85 

West,   Benjamin 87 

White   Chapel  Oub 91 

Whittier 102 

Weber,  Btookseller 103 

Wells,  Gabriel 113,  114 

Zorn 26,  83 


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